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QTeacijers' professional Htbrarg 

Edited by NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 

IN ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY 

SCHOOLS 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 

LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 

TORONTO 



N_ 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 

IN 

ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY 
SCHOOLS 



BY 



HENRY JOHNSON 

PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN TEACHERS COLLEGE 
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 



Nero ||ark 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1915 

All rights reserved 






Copyright, 1915, 
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 



Set up and electrotyped. Published July, 1915. 



Nortoooti $imb 

J. 8. Cushing Co. — Berwick <fe Smith Co. 

Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. 



JUL 22 1915 
©CI.A406840 






go, 

MY MOTHER 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/teachingofhistorOOjohn 

L 



EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION 

In beginning his illuminating treatment of the Holy 
Roman Empire, Lord Bryce wrote: "In history there 
is nothing isolated, and just as to explain a modern act 
of Parliament, or a modern conveyance of lands, we 
must go back to the feudal customs of the thirteenth 
century, so among the institutions of the Middle Ages 
there is scarcely one which can be understood until it 
is traced up either to classical or to primitive Teutonic 
antiquity." 

This is the first principle for the teacher of history 
to enforce, as it is the first lesson for the student of 
history to learn. History offers a third dimension to 
the superficial area of knowledge that each individual 
acquires through his own experience. When one boasts 
that he is not bound by any trammels of the past, he 
proclaims his own folly, and would, if he could, reduce 
himself to the intellectual level of the lower animals. 
He can only mean by such a phrase that he proposes 
to set out to discover and to explain the world of nature 
and of man as if nothing had been done before, and 
as if he were certainly competent for his mighty and 



Vlll EDITOR S INTRODUCTION 

self-imposed task. The wise man, on the contrary, will 
search the records of the past for their lessons, in order 
that he may be spared from trying to do again what 
has been once proved useless, wasteful, or wrong. He 
will watch the rise and fall of peoples ; the struggle of 
human ambition, greed and thirst for power ; the loves 
and hates of men and women as these have affected 
the march of events; the migration of peoples; the birth, 
development, and application of ideas ; the records of 
human achievement in letters, in the arts, and in sci- 
ence ; the speculations and the beliefs of men as to what 
lies beyond the horizon of sense, with a view to seeking 
a firm foundation for the fabric of his own knowledge 
and of his own belief. 

One of the wisest and most successful teachers of 
history that ever lived in America, Professor Francis 
Lieber of Columbia College, used a method peculiarly 
his own, and achieved exceptional results by so doing. 
In his college classes he assigned as the task for 
each exercise a definite number of pages in a popular 
manual of the history of Europe that was translated 
from the German. This manual was nothing more than 
a compact and desiccated collection of facts, including 
dates, names, and important events. Each pupil was 
required to master the contents of the assigned number 
of pages. When the class met, the teacher required a 
selected pupil, in the presence of his classmates, to 






EDITOR S INTRODUCTION IX 

write upon the blackboard a summary of the events 
that happened in Great Britain, for example, during 
the period under examination. By a system of cross- 
questioning the aid of the entire class was had in secur- 
ing the correctness of this summary. Then another 
pupil would be summoned to do the same thing for 
France, another for Germany, another for Italy, and 
so on until all the material included in the assigned 
portion of the textbook had been covered. Then the 
teacher, turning with a triumphant look to his class, 
was in the habit of saying : " Now you know what was 
happening in each of the great countries of Europe at 
a specified time. But why were those things happen- 
ing ? You do not know. You will not find out from 
your textbook, but I will tell you." Then the eloquent 
and learned scholar poured forth a wealth of illuminat- 
ing philosophical explanation that made the carefully 
memorized facts forever real in the minds of his fortu- 
nate pupils. There is no better way to study or to 
teach history than that. The fundamental data, the 
dates, the names, the bare events, must be learned by 
the pupil, and having been learned they must be inter- 
preted. Interpretation is the task of the teacher. 

For more than a generation past there has been a 
strong and steadily growing tendency to interpret the 
facts of history as the successive sequences in a chain 
of economic causation. It has been stoutly held and 



X EDITOR S INTRODUCTION 

taught that the actions of men and of nations are to 
be explained as the effects of purely economic causes. 
To accept this, however, as occupying anything more 
than a subordinate and a secondary place in the study 
of history, is to close one's eyes to the most obvious 
facts of human experience. No small part of the life 
of individuals and of nations is devoted to courses of 
action and to policies which are in direct conflict with 
men's obvious economic interests, but which are pursued 
because of belief in some principle, because of adhe- 
rence to some ideal, because of faith in something 
unseen and eternal. The scholarly and the true inter- 
pretation of history is to view it as the record of the 
social, the moral, and the intellectual education of man, 
with economic forces and laws playing a constant but 
a secondary part. 

It has become fashionable to decry chronology and 
to treat as unimportant a knowledge of the dates at 
which large events took place. But this tendency is 
one to be vigorously resisted. Chronology lies at the 
basis of history and furnishes it with a framework. 
Not to know the significance of dates such as 490 B.C., 
732 a.d., 1066, 1453, 1492, 1649, 1789, 1815, and 1914, 
is to miss the clue to the power to group events in 
their natural order and in their causal sequence. 

He will be a fortunate student, too, who is guided by 
a study of history through the gates that lead to litera- 



EDITOR S INTRODUCTION XI 

ture. Herodotus and Thucydides, Livy and Tacitus, 
Gibbon and Macaulay, von Ranke and Mommsen, 
Laurent and Martin, are not only historians but men 
of letters. They reveal to the student of history the 
play upon the records of the past of high intellectual 
power, working with the instruments of the fine art of 
expression. The teacher of history who awakens in 
his pupils a love of the literature of history and a love 
of the literature that constitutes so large a part of the 
subject-matter of history, will not have taught in vain. 



NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER 



Columbia University, 
May 18, 1915 



PREFACE 

The literature called forth by school instruction in 
history during the last three hundred years is in some 
respects a melancholy literature. Much of it can, with- 
out great effort, be read as a sort of continuing diagno- 
sis of unsound conditions. Something was apparently 
wrong in the seventeenth century, when history first 
began to be taught seriously as an independent school 
subject, and something has apparently been wrong ever 
since. This might be indicative merely of a progressive 
spirit forever discovering that the good of yesterday is 
no longer good to-day. But the facts admit of no such 
flattering interpretation. The ills on view in each gen- 
eration have been in large part ills on view in each pre- 
ceding generation. So, too, much of the advanced 
thought on how to improve conditions has been merely 
the unconscious revival of old thought. Before history 
had really begun to disturb the peace of schoolmasters, 
Comenius, in his Great Didactic, completed in 1632, 
made provision for the subject in every year of the 
school course and emphasized aspects of history which 
we, with the zest of pioneers, are emphasizing now. 



XIV PREFACE 

Before history had become more than a respectable 
exception in actual school programs, Christian Weise, 
in 1676, found the spell of the ancients over-potent and 
argued, much as we argue now, in favor of the modern 
period. By the end of the eighteenth century school 
instruction in history had been charged with most of the 
faults which we attribute to it now, and reformers had 
already anticipated most of the correctives which we are 
now striving to apply. 

Similar impressions of continuing ills and of recurring 
advanced thought on how to meet them are left by 
other chapters in the history of human endeavor. But 
the conditions presented by the history of history teach- 
ing suggest a somewhat curious inconsistency. Teachers 
of history have labored diligently to improve the world 
in general through history in general. It does not 
appear from the record that they have labored diligently 
to improve their own calling through the special history 
of that calling. The joy of independent discovery is 
not a matter to be treated lightly. It is, moreover, 
better on principle to be an originator than to be an 
imitator. But teachers of history are committed by 
their own logic to a study of the experiences of other 
teachers. Believing, as they do believe, that the past 
of humanity in general is of value to humanity in gen- 
eral, they are scarcely in a position to deny that the 
past of history teaching is of value to teachers of his- 



PREFACE XV 

tory. Surely, to them, beyond teachers of any other 
subject, it should be apparent that there is an element 
of futility in sailing without charts seas that have already 
been charted and in making discoveries that have 
already been discovered. There are, it may be added, 
wide opportunities for independent exploration the 
nature of which can be understood only by those who 
embark with some knowledge of what has already been 
accomplished. 

It is in this faith that the author has attempted in the 
following pages a broader survey of past and present 
conditions than has hitherto been included in a boe&on 
the teaching of history. The treatment is necessarily 
inadequate, but not, it is hoped, as superficial as the 
meager citation of authorities might suggest. Most of 
the generalizations are based upon materials of which 
the footnotes convey no hint, and of which they could 
not, without expansion unsuitable for a work of this 
character, convey any hint. The most that can be 
claimed for this part of the work is, however, that it 
may furnish some indication of what, in the course of 
three centuries, has been thought and done in the 
teaching of history. 

The greater part of the book is devoted to a discus- 
sion of underlying principles and their application to 
present problems of history teaching in the United 
States. The aim has been to present as concretely as 



XVI PREFACE 

possible the fundamental conditions of making history 
of any kind effective in the schoolroom. There has 
been no concealment of a personal conviction that the 
study of history in school may be, and should be, a seri- 
ous study of history. But this involves merely a further 
application of principles of presentation which are, it is 
believed, as valid for those who refuse to carry them 
beyond the story or information stage of history teach- 
ing as for those who believe that school history should 
include illustrations of how historical truth is established. 

The author's own faith in the ability of boys and girls 
to cope with history is frankly greater than that com- 
monly professed in educational discussion. But it has 
not been established "without works." Beginning, 
twenty-five years ago, with all the psychological and 
pedagogical tenderness that the latest defender of the 
rights of childhood could desire, the author has been 
led step by step, through direct experience in the class- 
room, to a conviction that history of almost any kind 
can be taught at almost any stage of instruction on the 
simple condition that it is taught in a sensible way. 
The evidence is in part the exercises suggested in this 
book, exercises which, however they may be judged on 
other grounds, have in every case been personally tested 
under average school conditions. 

No headings nor marginal comments have been in- 
cluded in the body of the book, but a substitute for such 



PREFACE XV11 

aids to analysis of the text is furnished by the table of 
contents. A bibliography of history teaching, a list of 
guides to historical literature, a bibliography of illustra- 
tive material, suggestions for a collection of illustrative 
material, annotated references for further reading, and 
questions on the text will be found at the end of the 
volume. 

The author has drawn freely upon portions of his 
earlier pamphlet, 1 but most of the present treatment is 
new. He is indebted to his wife for constant and 

invaluable assistance. 

HENRY JOHNSON. 

New York, 

June 14, 1915. 

1 The Problem of Adapting History to Children in the Elementary 
School. Teachers College Record, November, 1908. Out of print. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Editor's Introduction vii 

Preface * . . . . xiii 

CHAPTER I 
WHAT HISTORY IS 

The Past and its Traces i 

Traditions and remains 2 

Primary and derived sources 3 

Inadequacy of sources 4 

The Historical Method 6 

External criticism 7 

Internal criticism 10 

Results of criticism 16 

Kinds of synthesis 17 

Early Conceptions or History 19 

Herodotus 19 

Thucydides .21 

Buckle's Estimate of Historians 23 

The Scientific Conception of History .... 24 
The search for laws of human action . . . .25 

Generalization and the question of what is important . 25 

The idea of development 26 

Current Views of History 27 

CHAPTER II 

THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 

General Attitude toward the Problem ... 28 

Difficulties often pointed out 29 

xix 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



Difficulties should not be exaggerated . 

Tendency to apply preconceived ideas . 
General Theories 

The doctrine of natural tastes and interests . 

The culture-epoch theory 

From the near to the remote .... 

Approach from the Side of History 

Conditions presented by the externals of life 

Conditions presented by past mental states . 

Particular facts and general facts 
• Grading, a problem in presentation 
Difficulties Common to all Conceptions of Grading 

Localization essential 

The time sense 

The place sense 

Summary of Possibilities 



/ 



, CHAPTER III 
THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 

The Formulation of Aims of Instruction 

Two modes of procedure 

History shaped by predetermined good 
Aims Commonly Proposed for History 

Contradictions and inconsistencies 

Aims not peculiar to history 

Objection to indiscriminate listing of aims 

Tendency to treat aims as values 
Criticism of Values Claimed for History 

Tangible results admitted and condemned 

Nietzsche's diagnosis of historitis . 

Protest of futurists .... 

"Exaggerated respect" for the past not impossible 

Tangible results denied 



PAGE 
30 
30 
31 
31 
32 
38 
40 
40 
42 

44 
5o 
Si 
5i 
52 
53 
53 



SS 
55 
57 
59 
60 
61 
63 
64 
65 
65 
66 
67 
68 
69 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



The Search for Specific Aims and Values 
Need of recognizing kinds of history- 
Conditions presented by uncritical history 
Conditions presented by critical history 
Controlling aim suggested by idea of development 

Making the Social World Intelligible 
General procedure 
Incidental consequences 
Some objections examined 
Kinds of facts to be emphasized 

History for its own Sake 



PAGE 

7i 
72 
72 
73 
74 
75 
75 
76 
78 
81 
82 



CHAPTER IV 
HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 



Before the Seventeenth Century . 

Early use of traditions .... 

Obstacles to more formal instruction 

Sixteenth-century advocates of history . 
The Seventeenth Century .... 

Comenius 

Christian Weise 

History in the schools of the Oratorians 
The Eighteenth Century 

Conditions unfavorable to history 

Leading advocates of historical instruction 1 

General conceptions of school history . . . 

Influence of Rousseau 

The Nineteenth Century 

Objections to history exceptional . 

Patriotism turned attention to national history 

Patriotism the dominant purpose 

Effect of patriotism on school programs 

Conceptions of grading history 



84 
84 
84 
86 
87 
87 
87 
88 
88 
88 
89 
91 
93 
94 
94 
96 
98 
99 
101 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



History Programs for Secondary Schools 

Programs for boys in France ...... 103 

Programs for girls in France 109 

Programs for boys in Germany no 

Programs for girls in Germany 116 

Programs in other countries 118 

General Conditions in Elementary Schools . . .123 
Some typical elementary programs . . . .124 

Summary of Progress to the Present . . . .125 

CHAPTER V 

HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN THE 

UNITED STATES 

Beginnings of Historical Instruction . . . .127 

Conditions before 1815 , . 127 

History in academies 128 

History in elementary schools 130 

Early conceptions of the subject . . . . -131 

Development up to about 1870 131 

Position of History, 1870-1892 132 

The Madison Conference 134 

Influence of College Entrance Requirements . .137 
Committee of Seven . . . . . . .142 

Committee of Five 148 



Committee of Fifteen 

Committee of Twelve 

Various Suggestions for Elementary Programs 

Committee of Eight 

Comparisons with Europe .... 

American Conservatism 

Demand for Social Studies . . ./ . 



150 

151 
152 
i54 
155 
158 
iS9 



CHAPTER VI 
THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 

The Biographical Approach Defined . . . . 161 
Early Conceptions of Biography 162 



TABLE OF CONTENTS XX111 

PAGE 

Rousseau an Advocate of Biography .... 163 

Biography Adapted to Schools 163 

The Argument for Biography 164 

Principles of Selection 165 

Moral and Patriotic Aims 168 

Biography and the Great- Man Theory . . . .171 

Grouping Men about Events 173 

Lack of Continuity in Biographical Treatment . .176 

CHAPTER VII \ 

THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 

Differentiation from Biography 178 

Group Activities in Early School History . . .179 

Demands for a Larger View 179 

Materials for a Larger View 180 

Carlyle and Macaulay 181 

Weber's Lehrbuch 182 

The Campaign for Kulturgeschichte .... 183 

Finding Group Characteristics 186 

First Steps in the Study of Social Groups . . .189 
Introduction through History of Manhattan Island . 190 
Study of a Broom-corn Community . . . .194 

Materials for Studies of Larger Groups . . .196 

Biedermann's Plan 197 

Need of a Comprehensive Scheme of Classification . 198 

CHAPTER VIII 

MAKING THE PAST REAL 

The Process Involved 202 

Use of the Community 203 

Museums 205 

Historical Excursions 206 

Special Aids to Visualization 208 

Casts and Models 209 






TABLE OF CONTENTS 



Pictures 

Maps, Charts, and Diagrams . 

Conditions Presented by Verbal Description 
Generalities in elementary history- 
Appearance of interest may be misleading 
Need of concrete details 

Obstacles to Use op Details . 

Special Devices for Utilizing Details . 

Realization of the Past at Best Difficult 



PAGE 
2IO 
213 

215 
2l6 
217 
218 
219 
221 
223 



CHAPTER IX 

THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 

Primary Purpose 225 

The Exhibition Idea . 226 

Nature of the Images Evoked 227 

Abstraction in Models and Pictures . . . .228 

The Conception of Size 229 

Visualizing Details 231 

Interpretation 231 

Study of a Roman House — Hensell Model . . .232 

The Story Element in Pictures 234 

Need of Supplementary Verbal Description . . . 235 

The ^Esthetic Factor 236 

Exercises in Identifying Models and Pictures . .237 
Why Models and Pictures should be Accurate . . 239 



CHAPTER X 

THE USE OF MAPS 

Data in Map Representation 241 

Why Maps are Essential 242 

The Pointing Exercise 242 

Realizing Location 244 

Estimating Extent and Area 247 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



XXV 



Adjustment to Differences in Scales of Maps 
Adjustment to Differences in Map Projections 
Visualizing Actual Geographical Environment 
Geographic Conditions and Human Development 
Historical Geography 
Exercises in Map Construction 
Reproductions from memory 
Constructions from documents 

Decree of Louis the Pious, 817 

Route of Columbus, 1492 

Land grants, Charter of 1606 

Materials for other studies 



PAGE 
250 
2SO 

251 
252 

254 
257 
257 
258 
259 
260 
263 
268 



CHAPTER XI 

TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 

Relation of the Textbook to School Instruction 
Classification of Textbooks .... 
Characteristics of American Textbooks 

Books for intermediate grades 

Books for grammar grades .... 

High school textbooks 

Brevity Need not Imply Vagueness 
The Question of Accuracy . 
Point of View and Proportions . 
Pictures, Maps, and Diagrams . 

References for Collateral Reading 

Table of Contents and Index 

Pedagogical Adds 

Qualities that Make a Book Interesting 



THE 



CHAPTER XII 
USE OF TEXTBOOKS 



Place of the Textbook in American Schools 
Place of the Textbook in European Schools 



269 
270 
271 
271 
272 
276 

277 
280 
281 
283 
283 
284 
284 
285 



286 
287 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



The Old-fashioned Textbook Recitation 

Type of Recitation Determined in Part by Type 

Textbook 

Use of Summary Type 

Use of Fuller Textbook Treatment 

Preliminary Tests of Pupil's Abiliiy 

Questions as Aids to Study 

Outlines as Aids to Study 

Problems as Aids to Study 

Dictation and Explication in France 

Need of Training in Independent Study , 

The Question- and -Answer Method 

The Cooperative Outline 

Teaching the Pupil how to Study . 

Other Uses of the Textbook . 

The Use of more than One Textbook 

The Art of Questioning . 

Written Work 

Giving the Pupil a Chance 



CHAPTER XIII 



v/ 



PAGE 
289 

291 
291 
294 

295 
297 
299 
301 
304 
30S 
307 
307 
308 
3ii 
312 
313 
3i8 
319 



THE SELECTION AND MANAGEMENT OF COLLATERAL 
READING 

American Theory and Practice 323 

Some Fundamental Defects 325 

Preliminary Questions 328 

Why Collateral Reading is Essential . . . .329 
Differentiation of Aims and Treatment . . .331 

Appeals to sense of reality 331 

Readings for information 331 

Readings for inspiration 332 

Illustrating historical literature . . . . . S33 
Illustrating the historical method 334 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



XXV11 



General Range of Selection 335 

Reading to the Class 336 

Reading by the Class 339 

How to Assign Collateral Reading .... 341 

The Pupil's Record of Reading 343 

Tests of Material 344 

The Selection of a Library 345 

A Bad Tradition 348 



'/CHAPTER XIV t/ 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 



History as Assured Knowledge .... 


3SO 


Elementary school Columbus .... 


35i 


A critical historian's Columbus .... 


352 


Arguments for a Dogmatic Treatment . 


354 


To avoid confusion 


354 


To further "salutary purposes" .... 


355 


Errors unimportant 


356 


His Story and History 


356 


Argument for Discrimination 


358 


Processes to be Illustrated 


359 


Raising the Question of How we Know . 


361 


Elementary Exercises in Historical Criticism 


365 


A textbook exercise 


366 


The Pocahontas story 


368 


An author and his sources 


372 


Elementary Exercises in Synthesis 


377 


Illustrations of the Historical Method for the Hige 


[ 


School 


378 


Classification of materials 


379 


A printed form 


379 


Subjects for papers 


380 


Quests for material 


• 380 


Analysis of material 


382 



XXV111 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



Criticism illustrated by critics 
Exercises in grouping facts 



/ 



CHAPTER XV 



v/ 



THE 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH 
SUBJECTS IN THE CURRICULUM 

Incidental Correlation .... 
Systematic Correlation .... 
Conditions oe Systematic Correlation 
Relations between History and Geography 

Correlation in European schools . 

Conditions in the United States 
Relations between History and Literature 

History for the sake of literature . 

The search for mutual contributions 

Claims for historical fiction 

Historians and the historical novel 

Contributions of history to literature 

Contributions of literature to history . 
Relations between History and Government 

Correlation in Europe 

Views of Committee of Seven 

Views of Committee of Political Science Association 

Arrangement suggested by Committee of Five 
History as a Central Subject in the Curriculum . 



PAGE 

383 
38S 



OTHER 



389 
39i 
393 
394 
394 
397 
398 
398 
399 
401 
402 
405 
406 
406 
407 
408 
409 
411 

413 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 

Early School Examinations 

European Examination Systems .... 
School Examinations in the United States . 
General Conceptions oe the History Examination 
An Examination Paper in History Set in England 



414 
416 
4i7 
419 
419 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



XXIX 



Pro 



An American College Entrance Examination in History 
Criticism of the Two Papers . 
Answers of Examiners to such Criticism 
Truth on Both Sides .... 

History Examinations should Include Tests of 

cesses 

Possible modes of procedure . 
Illustrative exercises 
Map interpretation 
Comparison and appreciation 
Determination of facts . 
Recognition of degrees of probability 
Finding what is important 
Adjustment to existing conditions 



Appendix I. 

Appendix II. 

Appendix III. 



Appendix IV. 
Appendix V. 



Bibliography of History Teaching 
Guides to Historical Literature 
Bibliography of Illustrative Material 
with Suggestions for a Small Col 
lection of Foreign Material 
Selected References 
Questions on the Text 



PAGE 

421 
423 
424 
426 

427 
428 

429 
429 

43i 
432 
433 
436 

439 

443 



446 
4SO 
475 



/ 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 

CHAPTER I 
What History Is 

History, in its broadest sense, is "everything that 

ever happened. It is the past itself, whatever that 

may be. But the past cannot be observed directly. 

What is known about it must be learned from such 

traces of former conditions and events as time and 

chance and the foresight of man may have preserved. 

Our practical concern in forming a conception of his- 

is, therefore, with these traces, the method em- 

d in studying them, and the results of the study. 

Traces of past facts of any kind may be regarded as 

Die material. We speak of a history of plants, 

limals, and even of inanimate nature. But his- 

in the usual acceptation of the term means the 

ry of man. The materials to be studied are the 

s left by his existence in the world, his thoughts, 

igs, and actions. 

le traces left by the human past are, by students of 



2 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

history, commonly called sources. They are found in 
forms so various that exhaustive classification is difficult 
and complete enumeration impossible. In some sense, 
everything that man now is or has is a trace left by the 
past : present personal memories, present mental habits, 
present ideals, present social customs and institutions, 
language, literature, material products of human in- 
dustry, physical man himself and the physical remains 
of men. In general, two kinds of sources are distinguish- 
able : (i) those that bear some evidence of conscious 
intent to transmit information ; and (2) those that 
have come down to us as mere relics or survivals of past 
conditions or events. Sources of the first kind are 
often called traditions. They include : (1) oral tradi- 
tions, reports, that is, transmitted orally — legends, 
sagas, ballads, anecdotes; (2) written or printed rec- 
ords — inscriptions, genealogical tables, lists of officials, 
annals, chronicles, memoirs, biographies, narratives in 
general ; (3) pictorial representations — paintings, 
statues, photographs of persons or places, plans of 
buildings, of cities, of battlefields, maps, diagrams. 
Sources of the second kind are often called remains. 
They are, as the term suggests, actual survivals of the 
past in language, in literary or other artistic expression, 
in industrial productions, in laws and customs. The 
distinction thus indicated is, for some purposes, im- 



WHAT HISTORY IS 3 

portant. It is, however, not one that can be applied 
in any absolute way. Some sources may be regarded 
either as conscious or unconscious testimony, that is, 
either as traditions or remains, according to the point 
of view from which they are considered. A newspaper, 
for example, contains conscious representations of con- 
ditions and events ; it is at the same time, not only a 
direct material remain, but, even as a report, an un- 
conscious reflection of the tastes, the interests, the 
desires, and the spirit, of its day. Not all remains are 
traditions, but all traditions are, from one point of view, 
remains. 

Sources are further distinguished as primary and 
derived. Primary sources, called also original sources, 
and sometimes simply sources, are either direct material 
remains, or the direct impression or expression, in some 
form, of the age to which they relate. They may be 
roads, bridges, buildings, monuments, coins, tools, 
clothing, human remains. They may be personal 
memories of facts actually observed, reports made by 
actual observers, actual texts of laws, decrees, orders, 
charters, constitutions, judicial decisions, treaties, offi- 
cial instructions, business documents. Derived sources 
may be secondary, that is, representations based directly 
upon primary sources; they may be tertiary, that is, 
representations based directly upon secondary sources; 



4 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

they may be representations based upon other repre- 
sentations to the nth degree. But here again the classi- 
fication is not one that can be applied in any absolute 
way. In the first place, many sources are of a mixed 
character, partly primary and partly derived. Com- 
paratively few observers confine their reports to what 
they themselves have directly observed. Statements 
based upon their own observation are mingled with 
statements based upon the reports of others. Similarly 
derived sources may be in part secondary, in part ter- 
tiary, in part of the nth degree. In the second place, 
the same source may for one purpose be primary and 
for another purpose derived. John Fiske's account of 
what happened at Lexington, April 19, 1775, is a pri- 
mary source for determining John Fiske's conception 
of the events at Lexington ; it is a derived source for 
obtaining information about the events themselves. 

The mass of existing sources is in the aggregate enor- 
mous. No single mortal mind can hope to explore them 
all. Yet most facts in passing leave no durable trace. 
Most of them, indeed, vanish almost immediately in ob- 
livion. This is true of the twentieth century with all its 
marvelous agencies for discovering and recording itself. 
It is obviously true in a higher degree of earlier cen- 
turies. The farther back we go, the greater in genera 
the proportion of loss. The remoter past is thus lefi 



WHAT HISTORY IS 5 

exceedingly obscure. Fragments of human skeletons 
and objects of human workmanship are found in such 
positions in the earth and in such relations to other 
remains as to suggest a great antiquity for man. Dif- 
ferences in workmanship and in the kinds of material 
used suggest certain broad stages of development. 
But little more of the earlier progress of man is indicated. 
Traces of particular events have not survived. No one 
knows, for example, how or when or where men invented 
the bow and arrow, how or when or where they first 
learned to make fire and to apply it in their arts, how or 
when or where they first tamed the dog and cow. For 
the transmission of information of this character tradi- 
tions of some kind are indispensable. Without them so 
little can, on the whole, be known that the entire period 
for which they no longer exist is commonly described as 
"prehistoric." The duration of this period is uncertain. 
Current estimates of it reach tens and even hundreds of 
thousands of years. In any case, what is called the 
" historic period," the period, that is, beginning with 
recorded traditions, is in comparison relatively brief. 
The oldest traditions can scarcely be dated back more 
than six or seven thousand years. The beginnings of 
any considerable accumulation of them can scarcely be 
dated back more than three thousand years, and even 
here the course of life is, in the main, indicated vaguely 



6 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

and in a disconnected way. The conditions are not of 
course uniform for all peoples and countries. The 
beginnings of the historic period in Egypt lie far back of 
the beginnings in Greece ; the beginnings of the historic 
period in Greece lie far back of the beginnings in England ; 
the beginnings of the historic period in England lie far 
back of the beginnings in America. In any case, how- 
ever, it is scarcely until we approach the thirteenth cen- 
tury of the Christian era that traditions become rela- 
tively full, relatively definite, and relatively continuous. 
The distinction between prehistoric and historic is, 
therefore, somewhat misleading. There is no sudden 
nor general dissipation of darkness in passing from one 
/ to the other. The historic period is, for most countries, 
in places quite as obscure as the prehistoric period. v Nor 
is there evidence of any sudden or general advance in 
the conditions of human life to mark the transition and 
justify the distinction. The most that can be said is 
that the sources, always fragmentary, are more so for 
some periods than for others, that most of the sources 
now extant relate to comparatively recent times, and 
that the oldest sources consist exclusively of uncon- 
scious material remains. 

The method employed in studying sources is the his- 
torical method. It embraces two kinds of operations, 
criticism and synthesis. Criticism seeks, in the first 



WHAT HISTORY IS 7 

place, to determine the specific character of a source. 
Is the source what it purports to be or is represented 
to be? Is it an original or a copy or reconstruction? 
If an original, has it been altered in the course of trans- 
mission? If a copy or reconstruction, does it reproduce 
with accuracy the original? Questions such as these 
belong to the domain of external criticism. Illustrations 
of the need of asking them are not far to seek. One 
has but to visit shops where " antiques" are offered for 
sale, or follow the interesting discoveries of "new his- 
torical material" reported from time to time in the 
newspapers. A wax bust acquired by a museum in Ber- 
lin is attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, but claimed also 
for a modern Englishman. A letter credited to Grover 
Cleveland, and published as his shortly after his death, 
is repudiated by his executors. A facsimile of a colonial 
newspaper designed to throw new light on the Meck- 
lenburg Declaration of Independence is shown to be 
fraudulent. Other recent discoveries include a rune- 
stone from Minnesota, alleged to have been left there 
by the Norsemen in 1362, and a copper cylinder from 
Michigan, said to contain the diary of Noah. 

It is the province of external criticism to clear the 
field of spurious sources and to determine the origin and 
original form of sources accepted as genuine. In the 
case of written or printed documents, the aim is to 



8 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

produce a "pure text," with indications as to authorship 
and time, place, and circumstances of composition. 
This is often a complicated matter. In a multitude of 
cases the originals of documents have been lost and only 
copies have come down to us, many of them anonymous 
and undated, many of them made, not from originals, 
but from other copies. There is internal evidence that 
the scribes, even when capable and conscientious, were 
at best fallible and that often they were neither capa- 
ble nor conscientious. Petrarch in his day found them 
so incompetent that he declared the task of writing a 
book easier than that of getting one properly copied. 
"Such," he says, "is the ignorance, laziness, or arro- 
gance, of these fellows that they do not reproduce what 
you give them but write out something quite different." * 
With the introduction of printing, conditions were 
vastly improved, but the occasion for criticism like 
Petrarch's did not entirely pass away. Cotton Mather, 
reading his Magnolia fresh from the press, was moved 
to add to his catalogue of impossibilities a "book printed 
without erratas." Recalling other offenses of composi- 
tors, he went so far as to accuse them of having put 
into the Psalms, in one edition of the Bible, the statement, 
"Printers have persecuted me." 2 Such formal docu- 

1 Robinson and Rolfe, Petrarch, 28. 

2 Magnolia Christi Americana, Edition of 1853, p. xxxvii. 



WHAT HISTORY IS Q 

ments as wills, laws, charters, and constitutions are 
naturally drawn with care, and when there is occasion 
for reproducing them, whether in manuscript or print, 
they are likely to be reproduced with care. But the 
production of perfect copy, even in cases that put no 
special strain upon the intelligence, demands a degree 
of sustained attention difficult to attain. Witness the 
record of unsuccessful attempts to print the exact text 
of the Constitution of the United States. 1 

External criticism is usually work for the expert and 
not for the layman. Different kinds of sources require 
for their criticism different kinds of special knowledge. 
For sources relating to ancient and mediaeval times, 
one kind of question may involve appeals to archaeology ; 
another to philology ; another to epigraphy, the science 
which deals with the classification and explanation of 
inscriptions ; another to paleography, the science 
which deals with handwriting ; another to diplomatics, 
the science which deals with certain special classes of 
documents, such as charters, contracts, and official 
registers ; another to chronology ; and another to 
still other special sciences. The criticism of modern 
sources is less formidable and the training needed for 
it is less technical, but even here the critic must be able 
to use a more or less highly specialized apparatus and 

1 See American History Leaflet, No. 8, p. 2. 



IO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

to apply rules, principles, doctrines, and facts, beyond 
the ken of general readers of history. The labors of a 
long line of able and devoted scholars have been devoted 
to external criticism. Numerous fraudulent sources 
have been exposed. Multitudes of "pure texts" have 
been published. Many old monuments and buildings 
have been restored. Many more, like those of the 
Athenian Acropolis and the Roman Forum, have been 
reconstructed in drawings or pictures. Photography 
and the mechanical processes dependent upon it have in 
our day removed at least one factor of human error. 

External criticism seeks to ascertain when, where, and 
by whom, a source was produced and to determine pre- 
cisely its original form. The next step is to investigate 
the meaning of the source, and here the work of internal 
or higher criticism begins. The question of meaning, 
it is true, enters also into external criticism, but only 
as an aid in the determination of other questions. In- 
ternal criticism seeks the meaning as an end in itself. 
The ideal is to put ourselves in the place of the producer 
of the source, to reconstruct the mental states through 
which the painter passed in painting the picture, the 
sculptor in carving the statue, the author in writing the 
document. The procedure in approximating this ideal, 
at least in the case of the written or printed document, 
ought to be fairly familiar, for a very large part of the 



WHAT HISTORY IS II 

educational process consists in finding answers to the 
question, "What does the author mean?" The general 
rule is simple ; it is merely to study the source and 
not ourselves. The difficulty is in applying the rule. 
Take the case of the document. "What happens," 
says Fustel de Coulanges, "is that a kind of tacit contest 
goes on between the text and the preconceived opinions 
of the reader ; the mind refuses to grasp what is contrary 
to its idea, and the issue of the contest commonly is, 
not that the mind surrenders to the evidence of the 
text, but that the text yields, bends, and accommodates 
itself to the preconceived opinion. ... A man thinks 
he is contemplating an object, and it is his own idea that 
he is contemplating. He thinks he is observing a fact, 
and the fact at once assumes the color and the signifi- 
cance his mind wishes it to have. He thinks he is 
reading a text, and the words of the text take a par- 
ticular meaning to suit a ready-made opinion." l 

Language is at best somewhat elusive. The writer 
who can express himself exactly is, perhaps, as rare as 
the reader who can avoid "tacit contest" with a text. 
Even legislators and makers of constitutions, who, of 
all men, ought to define their intentions with exactness, 
sometimes find their most painstaking efforts defeated 

x Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 144, 
Note. 



12 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

by the equally painstaking efforts of the judges who 
are called upon to interpret the results. Often the 
problem of interpretation raises special questions. Did 
the author intend his statements to be taken literally 
or figuratively? Was he writing seriously or indulg- 
ing in humorous exaggeration? Did the words which 
he employed have in his day the meaning which 
we attribute to them to-day? Attention to the last 
question alone has in some cases revolutionized long- 
established opinions concerning the past. It must not, 
however, be supposed that all documents present diffi- 
culties so great as to require extraordinary effort to un- 
ravel their meaning. Many of them, for most uses, 
require for their interpretation only such effort as the 
most casual reader would put forth. 

For some purposes, to establish the character of a 
source and its meaning is sufficient. What is desired 
is acquaintance with the conceptions which men have 
held in the past, the images which were in their minds, 
their ways of looking at the world or the universe. It is 
information of this kind that makes up the substance 
of histories of art, of literature, of mythology, of phi- 
losophy, of science, of religious dogma, of law. But, for 
other purposes, to understand what an author said 
is only a beginning. Did he believe what he said? 
Was he in a position to know? Did he have the 



WHAT HISTORY IS 1 3 

ability to represent accurately what he saw or heard 
or read? 

Human observation, memory, and inference are 
fallible. Even our own experiences of yesterday may 
emerge faded and distorted from the accounts which we 
strive to give of them to-day. Trained reporters, writ- 
ing in the very midst of events, often differ widely in 
their versions of the simplest and most obvious of de- 
tails. Of the accounts of an episode in a peace con- 
gress, a few years ago, a speaker whose remarks had 
met with a somewhat unexpected retort afterwards 
said: "The reporters sat immediately in front of the 
platform. One man wrote that the audience was so 
surprised by my speech that it received it in complete 
silence ; another wrote that I was constantly interrupted 
by loud applause, and that at the end of my address 
the applause continued for minutes. The one wrote 
that during my opponent's speech I was constantly 
smiling ; the other noticed that my face remained grave 
and without a smile. The one said that I grew purple 
red from excitement, and the other found that I grew 
white like chalk. The one told us that my critic while 
speaking walked up and down the large stage ; and the 
other that he stood all the while at my side and patted 
me in a fatherly way on the shoulder." * 

1 McClure's Magazine, Vol. 29, p. 536. 



14 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

The failing is not confined to reporters for newspapers. 
A professional historian who visited Australia in 1885, 
describing his first view of Adelaide, wrote: "We rose 
slightly from the sea, and at the end of seven miles we 
saw below us in a basin with the river winding through 
it, a city of one hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants, 
not one of whom has ever known, or^^know, a mo- 
ment's anxiety as to the recurring regularitv%Lhis three 
meals a day." l A professional critic of lmW^^is, 
quoting the passage somewhat inaccurately, adds^Be 
following comment: "Adelaide is on high ground, not 
in a valley; there is no river running through it; its 
population was not more than 75,000; and at the very 
moment when Mr. Froude visited it, a large portion of 
the population was on the verge of starvation." 2 An- 
other professional critic, translating somewhat freely 
into French both the quotation and the comment, ends 
with actual famine for Adelaide. 3 Those who selected 
the site for the city thought apparently that they saw 
a river. "Adelaide," says a letter written in 1837, "is 
to be on the bank of a beautiful stream." 4 A recent 
historian of South Australia describes the site as compris- 

1 Froude, Oceana, 86. 

2 Fortnightly Review, December, 1894, p. 815. 

s Langlois et Seignobos, Introduction aux Etudes Historiques, 101. 
"Elle souffrait dhine famine." 

4 Hodder, History of South Australia, I, 63. 



WHAT HISTORY IS 1 5 

ing "a southern and northern elevation with a small 
valley and river between them," ! and the still more 
recent eleventh edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica 
places Adelaide "on the banks of the river Torrens." 
Doubtless citizens of Adelaide have had some moments 
of anxiety as to their "three meals a day." The year 
after Froude'^^|Nit "began with great depression. 
There wa^^rrought throughout the country." But 
" vej^p^T starvation " and "famine" seem to have 
ev^red the recorder. 2 Gazetteers of the eighties, it may 
be added, made the population of the city proper about 
38,000. 

Much of the material with which the student of his- 
tory has to deal is the work neither of trained reporters 
nor of trained historians. Much of it is of such a char- 
acter as to place him "in the situation of a chemist who 
should know a series of experiments only from the reports 
of his laboratory boy." 3 Much of it consists of reports 
made, not near the event, but long after, with memory 
grown dim and subject to distortion through the changes 
in point of view and in interest wrought by years. Much 
of it consists of reports made, not by actual observers, 
but by those who have heard or read the reports of 
others. Much of it is mere oral tradition the original 

1 Hodder, History of South Australia I, 63. 2 Ibid., II, 108. 

3 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 67. 



1 6 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

content of which may have disappeared altogether in 
the course of transmission. It is perhaps not strange, 
therefore, that some thinkers have despaired of knowing 
the past at all and have come to look upon history as 
little more than a collection of fables which men have 
agreed to believe. But here again the difficulties must 
not be overestimated. The principles and rules of 
internal criticism have been so clearly denned, and are 
now so skillfully applied by hundreds of investigators, 
that the line between the true and the false, or at least 
between the probable and the improbable, can, for an 
enormous mass of material, be drawn with assurance. 

Historical criticism lays the foundation for a rational 
belief that this or that particular event actually hap- 
pened, that this or that particular condition actually 
existed. It yields those isolated pieces of information 
which are ordinarily described as " the facts of his- 
tory." The way is thus prepared for synthesis, for 
the process, that is, of constructing from the facts a 
body of related knowledge. This implies selection of 
facts, grouping, generalization, organization. 'The prod- 
uct, conceived either as a body of knowledge or as an 
account or narrative in wl ich that body of knowledge is 
set forth, is history in the sense usually attached to the 
term by makers of definitions of history. 

Facts may be selected because they are interesting or 



WHAT HISTORY IS 1 7 

curious or memorable. They may be arranged in simple 
chronological order according to place of occurrence. 
They may be grouped for aesthetic effect. General- 
ization may be confined to such speculations or reflec- 
tions on events and their causes as happen to occur to 
the inquirer. The aim may be to perpetuate the fame 
of striking personalities and striking events ; it may be 
merely to make a good story. Constructions of this 
kind are commonly based upon imperfect criticism, some- 
times upon no criticism at all. They represent the 
simple narrative or story- telling conception of history. 
Again, facts may be selected because they are useful 
in business, in politics, in religion, in education. The 
search may be for precedents to enlighten statesmen, 
generals, and others, for arguments to support a cause 
or a theory, for ethical ideals to inspire the world in 
general. The facts, as in story-telling history, may be 
arranged either according to time and place of occur- 
rence, or with such modifications of this grouping as 
promise to heighten aesthetic effect. Generalization 
may involve careful induction and may rise to the dig- 
nity of philosophic explanation. It may amount to 
little more than offhand moralizing designed to make 
the "lessons of history" as impressive as possible. 
Constructions of this kind represent the didactic con- 
ception of history. They may be based upon thorough- 



1 8 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

going criticism, for, in the opinion of many, the lessons 
of history to be really useful must also be really true. 
But didactic history may be as innocent of criticism 
as any mere story-telling history. 

Finally, facts may be selected because they are impor- 
tant or significant as illustrations or explanations of what 
the past was, of how it came to be what it was, of how 
the present grew out of it. Every condition or event 
may be viewed as a stage in a continuous process of dev el- 
opm ent or e volu tion. Every condition or event may be 
conceived as related to something that went before and 
to something that came after. In any series the facts 
selected may be those that seem best to represent and 
to explain a particular course of development. It may 
be the development of an individual, of a nation, of 
government, of religion, of education ; it may be the 
development of cookery, of dressmaking, or even of 
toys. The ideal, which is of course unattainable, is 
to represent and to explain the whole development of 
civilization. Here criticism assumes its full function, 
for the aim of this kind of construction is first and fun- 
damentally to be true. It represents the scientific 
conception of history. 

History admits, therefore, of no very exact definition. 
Historical construction varies, and has varied through 
the ages, with the varying tastes, interests, and purposes 



K 



J* 



WHAT HISTORY IS 19 



of historians. The earliest representations of past 
v conditions and events seem to have been those of epic 
^poets and story-tellers, who, untroubled by the problems 
of criticism, usually took what appealed to them or 
promised to appeal to their public, and whose " visions," 
embracing chiefly gods and heroes, we now classify as 
myths, legends, and fables. The original of the word 
y " history," a creation of the Greeks, had, however, from 
the beginning a more serious meaning. It is applied in 
Homer to the examination of evidence in a legal dispute. 
A case is brought before a man of skill who " inquires 
into the alleged facts and decides what the true facts 
are." l urropfy (historie), in early Greek usage, meant 
such an inquiry, or any inquiry designed to elicit truth, 
hence the knowledge so obtained, information on any 
subject. This was, of course, not history in the sense 
here under consideration. But when Herodotus, in 
the latter half of the fifth century B.C., applied the term 
to distinctly historical information and for the " showing 
forth" of his " Inquiry" composed the famous narrative, 
which in time won for him the honorable title of " father 
of history," it wa£ still information collected in the old 
spirit of inquiry. That spirit had, indeed, without the 
name, already been applied to historical inquiry. Even 
some of the poets had done a certain amount of inquir- 

1 Bury, Ancient Greek Historians, 16. 



20 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ing and comparing, and Hecataeus of Miletus, who died 
about 476 B.C., had announced in sober prose : "I write 
what I deem to be true, for the traditions of the Greeks 
seem to me manifold and laughable." 1 But this early- 
criticism was naturally defective, and constructions 
based upon it continued to be largely mythical. Herod- 
otus was a real investigator. He traveled widely and 
collected a vast amount of information. His work, 
embracing the geography and history of the greater 
part of the world known to his day, reveals a conscious 
and constant seeker after truth, which, he is careful 
to warn the reader, is not always attainable. Fre- 
quently, when his inquiries leave him in doubt, he pre- 
sents opposing versions of the facts alleged, so that the 
reader can decide for himself which is the more prob- 
able version. Several times, also, he takes occasion ex- 
pressly to disclaim personal responsibility. "As to the 
tales told me by the Egyptians," he says, "any man 
may accept them to whom such things appear credible ; 
as for me, it is to be understood throughout the whole 
of the history that I write by hearsay that which is 
reported by the people in each place." 2 But Herodotus 
himself was above all a story-teller, an artist in prose, 
and his work, like many a less critical tale, professes no 

1 Encyclopedia Britannica, nth Ed., XIII, 528. 
2 Macaulay's Translation, Book VII, 122. 



WHAT HISTORY IS 21 

other aim than that of preserving the memory of what he 
conceived to be memorable. He was the father of 
narrative history and in this field he remains a master 
and model. 

While Herodotus in his closing years was still retouch- 
ing his history, severer standards of criticism and a dif- 
ferent conception of history were developing in the work 
of Thucydides, historian of the Peloponnesian War. 
Thucydides began to write when the war itself began, 
" believing that it would be great and memorable above 
any previous war," l and he continued his record with 
the progress of the war down to 411 B.C. By way of 
introduction he gave a brief summary of the preceding 
history of Hellas, the materials for which seemed to him 
very unsatisfactory. "Men," he complains, "do not 
discriminate, and are too ready to receive ancient tra- 
ditions about their own as well as about other countries," 2 
and he cites examples that seem to include Herodotus. 
His own sketch grasps essential facts in the mass of 
legends and so orders the facts as to exhibit a " reasoned 
march of development." The sources for the body of 
the work were of a different character. " I have," he 
says, " described nothing but what I either saw myself, 
or learned from others of whom I made the most careful 

1 Jowett's Translation, Book I, 1. 
i Ibid., 20. 



22 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

and particular inquiry. The task was a laborious one, 
because eye-witnesses of the same occurrences gave dif- 
ferent accounts of them, as they remembered or were 
interested in the actions of one side or the other." In 
the case of the numerous speeches reported, he does not 
profess to give the exact words, but expresses in his own 
way " the general purport of what was actually said." 
His purpose was not, like that of Herodotus, merely to 
preserve in pleasing form the memory of what was 
memorable. He considered it "very likely" that his 
narrative would prove " disappointing to the ear." " But 
if," he adds, "he who desires to have before his eyes a 
true picture of the events which have happened, and of 
the like events which may be expected to happen here- 
after in the order of human things, shall pronounce what 
I have written to be useful, then I shall be satisfied." * 
His aim was thus distinctly didactic. He hoped that 
his work would teach political lessons, not because 
they were presented as such, but because "a true pic- 
ture" of political conditions and events would of itself 
convey political lessons. He was the father of didactic 
history in its highest and best sense. 

For more than two thousand years after Herodotus 
and Thucydides the narrative and the didactic types 
of history seemed to exhaust the possibilities of historical 

1 Jowett's Translation, Book I, 22. 



WHAT HISTORY IS 23 

construction. The particular forms which they as- 
sumed, the particular kinds of facts which they cele- 
brated, the particular kinds of lessons or precedents 
which they sought to impress, the particular philosophies 
which they invoked to explain events were bewildering 
in their variety, but the general types persisted. The 
results, as seen by Buckle in 1857, were disappointing. 
Buckle praised the zeal of historians and conceded the 
" immense value of that vast body of facts which we 
now possess, and by aid of which the progress of man- 
kind is to be investigated," but the use that had been 
made of the facts presented to his mind " a very differ- 
ent picture." " The unfortunate peculiarity of the his- 
tory of man," he wrote, " is, that although its separate 
parts have been examined with considerable ability, 
hardly any one has attempted to combine them into a 
whole, and ascertain the way in which they are connected 
with each other. In nil the other great fields of inquiry, 
the necessity of generalization is universally admitted, 
and noble efforts are being made to rise from particular 
facts in order to discover the laws by which those facts 
are governed. So far, however, is this from being the 
usual course of historians, that among them a strange 
idea prevails, that their business is merely to relate 
events, which they may occasionally enliven by such 
moral and political reflections as seem likely to be 



24 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

useful. According to this scheme, any author who 
from indolence of thought, or from natural incapacity, 
is unfit to deal with the highest branches of knowledge, 
has only to pass some years in reading a certain number 
of books, and then he is qualified to be an historian ; 
he is able to write the history of a great people, and his 
work becomes an authority on the subject which it pro- 
fesses to treat." * 

The characterization was in a measure true. His- 
torians had either neglected the opportunity, or failed 
in the effort, "to rise from particular facts" to "the 
laws by which those facts are governed." This step 
Buckle now proposed to take, hoping thereby " to accom- 
plish for the history of man something equivalent, or at 
all events analogous," to what had been accomplished 
"by other inquirers for the different branches of natural 
science." 2 

The call to history to become a science had been 
sounded before Buckle, and has been sounded many 
times since. The thought at first was to apply to his- 
tory a procedure similar to that applied in the natural 
sciences. Facts were to be classified, not chronologically 
nor geographically, but logically, according to their 
intrinsic nature. A search was to be made for elements 

1 Buckle, History of Civilization in England, I, 3. 

2 Ibid., I, 5. 



WHAT HISTORY IS 25 

common to facts of a given kind and for relations. The 
results were to be combined with similar results derived 
from other groups and so on until general laws could be 
formulated. In this way history was to be elevated to 
the dignity of a science. Early expectations have, how- 
ever, not been realized. History has not actually be- 
come a science in the sense that physics and chemistry 
are sciences. The difficulty is not merely with man as 
"a free moral agent," a condition often alleged as fatal 
to any hope of formulating laws of human action; 
it is rather that historical generalization, following the 
lines of generalization in the natural sciences, seems 
unable to deal with a vitally characteristic factor in his- 
torical construction, namely, the question of what is 
important. 

The realities of history are unique realities. What 
happened once can never happen again. For any given 
reality the facts of importance are, then, not those 
common to a number of realities, but rather those that 
give to the one reality its uniqueness. The facts of im- 
portance in representing and explaining Luther are not 
those common to all leaders of religious revolt, but 
rather those that make Luther unique, that distinguish 
him from all other leaders. The facts of importance 
in representing and explaining the French Revolution 
are the facts that make the French Revolution unique, 



26 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

that distinguish it from all other revolutions. 1 It is 
conceivable that human action may come in time to 
be explained in terms of general laws, but even then the 
reality and succession of realities to be explained must 
continue to be described, if history is to retain any part 
of its present meaning. 

There is none the less, as we have seen, a scientific 
conception of history, and history is now rather generally 
called a science. Its fundamental idea, that of devel- 
opment, was apprehended by thinkers in ancient Greece 
and Rome and by thinkers in the Middle Ages, but it 
remained for the modern age really to comprehend and 
to apply it as a ruling idea. Development implies 
continuity, and continuity implies unity. The ancients 
conceived neither. The Romans, it is true, furnished 
through their world empire an object lesson in world 
oneness, and Polybius, in the first century B.C., was 
inspired by that empire to write a world history. But 
he missed essentially the significance of the lesson. 
Christianity emphasized the oneness of the world and 
in its conception of human destiny supplied material 
for theories of development. But history needed 
naturally the impetus and ideals of modern science and 
that vaster accumulation of historical data with which 
the modern world has been favored to make the concep- 

1 See American Historical Review, IX, 16. 



WHAT HISTORY IS 27 

tion of development scientific. The actual transforma- 
tion is an achievement almost of our own day. It has 
been wrought within the last seventy-five years. 

Uncritical histories of the narrative and didactic types 
are still being produced. There are still those who 
demand that history shall first of all be literature. There 
are others, the majority of schoolmasters among them, 
who demand that history shall first of all be lessons 
in morals, or patriotism, or social service. There are 
others, and here must be included a large part of the 
legion described as " the general reading public," who 
demand of history only that it shall be interesting. To 
many of these the very idea of scientific history with 
its destructive criticism, its denial of the right of per- 
sonal bias, and its sober gray of fact, amounting in many 
cases to a mere balancing of probabilities without defi- 
nite conclusions, is somewhat repugnant. Special stu- 
dents of the subject, however, as a rule now conceive 
of history primarily as scientific history, and scientific 
ideals influence, if they do not altogether control, most 
of the productive historical scholarship of our time. 



CHAPTER II 

The Problem of Grading History 

In dealing with history for school purposes the ques- 
tion of what can be done at various stages of instruction 
naturally precedes and conditions the question of what 
ought to be done. The materials selected and the 
manner of dealing with them must ultimately be deter- 
mined by educational ends. But, unless it be known 
how wide or how narrow the range of selection really is, 
there is danger, on the one hand, of overtaxing the abil- 
ities of pupils, and on the other hand, of missing what 
is best for the promotion of educational ends. This is 
apparent enough, and yet programs and textbooks in 
history are so often charged with the offense of making 
history unintelligible to pupils, and therefore useless or 
even harmful, or, if intelligible, of making it merely 
useless, that there is reason to suspect either some care- 
lessness or some lack of insight in many preliminary 
surveys of the field. It may be of course that history 
is at best a subject of doubtful value, but even this 
supposition must wait upon a determination of the 
materials and treatment to be valued. 
28 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 20. 

The difficulty of defining the possible range of selec- 
tion has often been emphasized. History, it is said, 
offers no elementary aspects, no regular order of pro- 
gression from the simple to the less simple, no clear 
principles of grading. In this respect history appears, 
then, to compare unfavorably with some other subjects. 
" In mathematics, for example," we read, " what a splen- 
did orderly progression from the simpler operations with 
numbers to the more complex, from arithmetic to al- 
gebra (involving the principles of arithmetic), from 
algebra to geometry (involving the principles of arith- 
metic and algebra), and from geometry out into the 
different subjects of higher mathematics, mechanics, 
and physics, involving all these basic principles of pure 
and descriptive algebra. In the languages again the 
principle of the blade, the ear, and the full corn in the 
ear is clearly marked out. From the elements of the 
grammar the student passes on to the simpler texts of 
the language, then to the standard works of literature. 
But where and what is the grammar of history? What 
are the digits of politics or the A B C's of foreign rela- 
tions?" 1 

The difficulty should not be exaggerated. Efforts to 
grade history have, perhaps, on the whole been less suc- 

1 Report, Association, of History Teachers of the Middle States and 
Maryland, 1906, p. 17. 



30 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

cessful than efforts to grade mathematics and the 
languages. But this may or may not be due to ad- 
vantages inherent in mathematics and the languages. 
The problem of grading mathematics, in spite of a 
certain " splendid orderly progression," was not, after 
all, solved in a day. The passing from grammar to 
"the simpler texts of the language" and " then to 
the standard works of literature," however " clearly 
marked out," is not even yet an entirely smooth and 
gentle ascent. 

That history of some kind can be presented at almost 
any stage of instruction is scarcely in need of argument. 
History, or what passes for history, is now actually being 
taught, frequently as early as the first grade of the ele- 
mentary school, sometimes even in the kindergarten. 
The problem of grading seems, therefore, to have been 
solved at least in part. That it has been solved less 
generally and less completely for history than for some 
other subjects is, perhaps, due not so much to difficul- 
ties inherent in history as to the attitude of educators 
toward the problem. Much of the discussion of history 
as a school subject has been based upon preconceived 
ideas that fix at the outset the materials and treatment 
to be tested and discourage examination of any other 
materials or treatment. Guidance, it is said, must be 
sought in the natural tastes and interests of children, in 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 3 1 

the culture-epoch theory, or in some other theory or 
principle that removes responsibility for any general 
inquiry into the conditions presented by the field as 
a whole. 

The doctrine of natural tastes and interests has been 
pronounced " pedagogical bed-rock." * Strictly inter- 
preted this seems to imply that history is to be considered 
available for school purposes so far as it relates to condi- 
tions and activities analogous to those which children 
daily on their own unobstructed initiative either favor 
with their attention or create. An ideal history for 
children, it has been seriously suggested, would be a 
history written by a child. By the same token no 
doubt an ideal history for boys would be a history written 
by a boy, an ideal history for girls would be a history 
written by a girl, and histories written by college pro- 
fessors should be read by college professors, a fate per- 
haps at times deserved. 

The natural tastes and interests of children can be 
I inferred from psychology, they can be observed in oper- 
ation, they can be tested by experiment. The problem 
of building a program upon them ought, therefore, to 
be relatively simple, and such a program ought beyond 
question to meet with the approval of children. These 
are important, and to those who are seeking the line of 

1 New York Teachers' Monographs, Vol. V, No. i, p. 90. 



32 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

least resistance, conclusive considerations. But " his- 
torical mindedness," it should be remembered, is not 
itself a natural state and therefore not likely to be a 
product of natural tastes and interests, even in manhood. 
It is something that comes to most of us, if it comes at 
all, thrqugh_conscious effort. We do not grow into it 
simply by growing up ; we are trained into it. A pro- 
gram based upon the natural tastes and interests of 
children, it should also be remembered, is not neces- 
sarily the only kind of program that is interesting. 
There is a learning to like, as well as a learning to do, 
by doing. There are acquired tastes and interests as 
well as natural tastes and interests. 

A more adequate basis for a school program in history 
than that supplied by the doctrine of natural tastes and 
interests is, in the opinion of many, found in the culture- 
epoch theory. According to this theory, the individual 
in his mental progress passes through epochs or stages 
similar to epochs or stages in the mental progress of the 
race. The individual, that is, in a sense recapitulates 
the mental experience of the race. From the point of 
view of the culture-epoch theory history is, then, to be 
considered available for school up to the point reached 
by the pupils in their recapitulation of the experience of 
the race. The conclusion has been happily phrased by 
Professor Laurie. " The childhood of history," he says, 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 33 

"is best for the child, the boyhood of history for the 
boy, the youthhood of history for the youth, and the 
manhood of history for the man." ! 

The culture-epoch theory as applied to history pro- 
grams admits of two interpretations. According to one 
interpretation facts are to be so selected and arranged 
as to keep children at each step of the way occupied with 
stages of race culture corresponding to the stage which 
they have themselves attained. Knowing, as advo- 
cates of this interpretation seem to know, that children 
in the first three or four grades of the elementary school 
are primitive beings, that in the fifth and sixth grades 
they are mediaeval, and that in the seventh and eighth 
grades they are becoming modern, the program maker 
has only to provide primitive civilization for pupils in 
the primitive stage of development, mediaeval civiliza- 
tion for pupils in the mediaeval stage, and modern 
civilization for pupils in the modern stage. Such a 
grouping of facts does not, it should be carefully ex- 
plained, imply chronological continuity in the history 
program. Usually, indeed, chronological continuity is 
specifically repudiated. In a program recently pub- 
lished, for example, the work of the second grade is 
outlined as follows : " The early Aryans ; life in ancient 
Egypt ; the tent dwellers, nomadic life, period of shep- 

d 1 School Review, IV, 650. 



34 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

herds, especially among the Hebrews ; the early Phoe- 
nicians ; primitive life among modern Afrikanders, 
primitive life in the far north ; primitive life in Japan, 
the Philippines, India, Hawaii, etc. ; primitive life among 
the North American Indians ; primitive life of the white 
man in America." Even in the work outlined by this 
program for the sixth grade the French Revolution and 
Napoleon precede the American Revolution. 1 The 
particular facts selected under this interpretation may 
be quite "historical" so far as they go, but usually the 
effort to keep them so is slight. 

The other interpretation involves a somewhat differ- 
ent procedure. It looks, not to the general cultural 
stages in the development of the race, but specifically to 
the development of the historical sense. Assuming that 
this unfolds in children after the manner of its unfold- 
ing in the race, the conclusion is reached that those 
conceptions of history which came first in the experience" 
of the race should come first also in historical instruc- 
tion, and that those conceptions which came late in 
the experience of the race should come late also in 
the history program. The earliest manifestations of the 
historical sense in the race being expressed in myths, 
legends, and fables, it follows that the introduction to 
school history should be through myths, legends, and 

1 Bliss, History in the Elementary Schools, 27, 47-48. 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 35 

fables. As these give way to semi-historical sagas, and 
these in turn to more or less critical narration, so must 
the history program change from one to the other on and 
up to, but not inclusive of, scientific history, a develop- 
ment so recent in the experience of the race as plainly 
to suggest the "manhood of history." The stage indi- 
cated as proper for beginning instruction of this kind 
ranges from the kindergarten to the fourth or fifth year 
of the elementary school and the rate of progress varies 
considerably. Some programs literally pass in the 
first four or five years from fable to saga and reach in 
the upper grades of the elementary school matter-of- 
fact history. Others are dominated throughout by the 
spirit of romance and poetry. "History," says Profes- 
sor Laurie, "cannot be reasoned history to a boy; even 
at the age of seventeen it is only partially so, but it can 
always be an epic, a drama, and a song." The inference 
is obvious : "We must teach history to the young as an 
epic, a drama, and a song." At the beginning of the 
course outlined by Professor Laurie, with boys of ten, 
"it is a story to be told, and the wandering minstrel of 
old is our model teacher." Even at the end, with boys 
of eighteen, the historians especially to be commended 
are apparently Shakespeare, Browning, and the histori- 
cal novelists. 1 

1 School Review, IV, 656, 660 



36 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

The significance of the culture-epoch theory for 
teachers of history rests upon two assumptions : (i) that 
all peoples in their cultural progress follow a certain 
uniform order of development which can be discovered 
and defined; and (2) that these stages represent in 
general a movement from the simple to the complex. 
If these assumptions are valid, it is at once obvious that 
the theory does supply a far-reaching principle for grad- 
ing historical facts according to their degree of difficulty. 
Both assumptions have, however, been seriously ques- 
tioned. Professor Boas has pointed out that some 
peoples "well advanced in the arts of life" have never 
discovered pottery, "one of the essential steps in the 
advance of civilization," and that "the invention of 
metallurgy, which marks so important an advance of 
European civilization, does not appear associated with 
analogous levels of development in other parts of the 
world." Similar remarks are applicable to other phases 
of industrial development. Again, advancing civiliza- 
tion does not seem necessarily to be always a movement 
from the simple to the complex ; it may, in some phases, 
be a movement from the complex to the simple. "It 
is perhaps easiest," says Professor Boas, "to make this 
clear by the example of language, which in many re- 
spects is one of the most important evidences of the 
history of human development. Primitive languages 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 37 

are, on the whole, complex. Minute differences in point 
of view are given expression by means of grammatical 
forms; and the grammatical categories of Latin, and 
still more so those of modern English, seem crude when 
compared to the complexity of psychological or logical 
forms which primitive languages recognize, but which 
in our speech are disregarded entirely. On the whole, 
the development of language seems to be such, that the 
nicer distinctions are eliminated, and that it begins with 
complex and ends with simple forms, although it must 
be acknowledged that opposite tendencies are not by any 
means absent." x 

The whole matter has been aptly summarized by Pro- 
fessor Thomas. "Different groups," he remarks, "take 
steps in culture in a different order, and the order depends 
upon the general environmental situation, the nature of 
the crises arising, and the operation of the attention." 
"This," he continues, "is a sufficient comment on the 
theory, sometimes used in pedagogy, that the mind of 
the child passes through epochs corresponding to epochs 
in the culture of the race. We have every reason to 
think that the mind of the savage and the mind of the 
civilized are fundamentally alike. There are, indeed, 
organic changes in the brain of the growing child, but 
these are the same in the children of all races. The 

1 Boas, Mind of Primitive Man, 182, 194. 



38 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

savage is not a modern child, but one whose conscious- 
ness is not influenced by the copies set in civilization. 
And the white child is not a savage, but one whose mind 
is not yet fully dominated by the white type of culture." * 
Another conception often applied is that history in 
school should begin with what is near in time and space 
and proceed by gradual stages to what is remote. The 
assumption here is that what is near is intelligible, that 
out of it may be formed an "apperception mass" suffi- 
cient to assimilate the less near, that through the result- 
ing accretion it becomes possible to assimilate the still 
less near, and so on to the remote. The first step is 
commonly a study of the home and its activities. This 
is followed by a study of the school and its activities, and 
this in turn by a study of the local community as a whole, 
its geographical environment, its industries, its social 
customs. Attention is then directed, by means of simple 
stories, to past conditions and happenings in the com- 
munity. The way is thus prepared for a similar treat- 
ment of other communities and for a consideration of the 
relations of one community to another. After four or 
five years of this kind of experience the historical sense 
is usually considered sufficiently developed to justify a 
chronological treatment of such history as may seem 
desirable. In the earlier stages the method is often 

1 Thomas, Source Book for Social Origins, 25-26. 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 39 

regressive. The pupil, that is, begins with the present 
and works his way backward into the past. The plan 
may be confined to an introductory chapter, as in 
Powell's History of the United States for Beginners, or 
to a few introductory topics, as in the work outlined for 
the sixth grade by the Committee of Eight. It may be 
more extended. 

The soundness of using the pupil's own immediate 
environment as a point of departure in the study of his- 
tory is beyond dispute. In every lesson throughout 
the history course there should be a constant passing 
from the near to the remote, and, it may be added, from 
the remote to the near. The principle is fundamental, 
but it is scarcely a principle of grading at all. The 
degree of nearness or remoteness can afford no adequate 
test of difficulty. The question, for example, of whether 
Socrates or Benjamin Franklin is the more suitable for 
study by children is scarcely to be answered by an 
appeal merely to the years or the miles that separate 
Socrates or Benjamin Franklin from us. 

The doctrine of natural tastes and interests, the culture- 
epoch theory, and the principle of proceeding from the 
near to the remote, as actually applied in the construc- 
tion of history programs, have, it must be admitted, been 
found to "work" in the sense of providing materials 
that are intelligible and interesting to children. This, 



40 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

in the opinion of some advocates, is a sufficient test of 
validity. But, waiving all other objections, it is clear 
that the answers thus returned to the question of what 
is possible for children are at best partial answers 
and that such must be the result of applying any doctrine, 
theory, or principle, that limits at the outset the range 
of inquiry. For more general answers there must be a 
more general exploration of the field. 

The past to be reconstructed embraces three general 
kinds of phenomena: (i) physical human beings and 
their physical environment ; (2) human words and 
actions; (3) human thoughts, feelings, and resolutions. 
Historical information, however organized and however 
presented, can be reduced to facts that relate to one or 
another of these general kinds of phenomena, or to their 
inter-relations. There may be, then, in the conditions 
under which facts of the types thus indicated are or may 
be apprehended some hint of the possible range of selec- 
tion. 

The conditions presented by facts of the first type are 
in many cases such that a direct appeal to the senses is 
possible. The eye can still rest upon a house that George 
Washington lived in, a hat that Napoleon wore, the food 
that some Pompeian was about to partake of when the 
great calamity came, the very features of an ancient 
Egyptian king. The ear, too, may have its part. The 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 4 1 

clocks of our grandfathers are still striking for us; 
church bells heard in the Middle Ages are still ringing 
for Europe. The sights and sounds of nature, the odors 
of wood and field, repeat themselves from generation 
to generation. Furthermore, much of the material 
past lends itself readily to direct representation in 
statues, casts, models, and pictures, such as are now 
being supplied in ever increasing variety for every coun- 
try within the pale of general human interest. 
-2^The conditions presented by facts of the second type 
admit to some extent of similar appeals. The actions 
and spoken words of the past are of course never before 
us in quite the way that material remains may be. No 
one can now actually see or hear Julius Caesar dictating 
his Commentaries, or Henry IV going to Canossa, or 
William Penn talking with the Indians. The only 
actions which can be directly observed now are actions 
which are in progress now. But many acts habitually 
performed in the present resemble acts habitually per- 
formed in the past — going to school, greeting guests at 
a reception, saying mass. Many more can by conscious 
effort be performed more or less after the manner of 
former times — kindling a fire with primitive apparatus, 
spinning with an antiquated wheel, brandishing a toma- 
hawk. An elaborate illustration of this type of recon- 
struction, whatever the originals might think of it, is 



42 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 



afforded by the numerous characters that walk and talk 
before the footlights in the historical drama. Action 
can also to some extent be suggested by statues and 
ordinary pictures. It can be fully represented in mov- 
ing pictures. Nor is this all. By the correlation of 
moving pictures with the phonograph it is possible not 
only to represent action itself but to reproduce the voices 
and other sounds that accompanied action. 
.7 The conditions presented by facts of the third type 
admit of no such appeals. Thoughts and feelings can 
neither be painted in pictures nor caught by any mechan- 
ical contrivance that has yet been invented. They are 
revealed, so far as they are revealed at all, in the " looks" 
of men, in deeds, and in words. There are, it is true, 
mental states of our own that resemble the mental 
states of men in the past, and it is to our own mental 
states that we habitually appeal in representing to our- 
selves the mental states of others. But even our own 
minds are, to most of us, more or less of a mystery. 
Who has not despairingly remarked after some act that 
seemed anything but complicated, "I wonder why I 
did that!" The mental states of a cave man, an In- 
dian, a pioneer, a Clovis, a Charlemagne, a Napoleon, 
have the advantage of being plainly described for us in 
our textbooks. But even with this advantage our 
ability to understand them depends upon our own 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 43 

mental experiences and upon our ability to analyze 
our own mental experiences. 

But, it may be urged, most of the facts of history are, 
regardless of their kind, on exhibition in verbal descrip- 
tion only. For most of them the conditions are, there- 
fore, equalized. In the first place, verbal description 
is usually inadequate. It rarely tells us all that we 
need to know to reconstruct either a material object 
no longer seen or a past mental state. In the second 
place, words are symbols only, mere " signs of psycho- 
logical operations." The images which they call up, 
the thoughts and feelings which they induce, alike vary 
with individual experience. There is some force in 
these suggestions. The elements with which the mind 
has to work in constructing from verbal description its 
images of the vanished externals of life are, however, 
still in the domain of the senses. Is it a building that is 
described? We have seen buildings. Are the dimen- 
sions given? We have used a foot rule. Were the walls 
a dull red? We have seen dull red. The details, so 
far as they go, can be referred to memories of sensory 
impressions and these can be verified, if necessary, by 
fresh appeals to buildings, a foot rule, and dull red. Is 
it an action that is described? The appeal is still to 
memories of sensory impressions and some verification 
through appeals to action itself is still possible. The 



44 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

elements with which the mind has to work in construct- 
ing from verbal description past thoughts and feelings 
remain more elusive and in general more dependent 
upon the mind's own previous experiences. 

Within these general types of facts there is, however, a 
Jk further distinction. The facts ma y be either p articular 
or general. They may relate in detail to individual 
objects, individual persons, individual actions, thoughts, 
or feelings. They may in varying degrees of abstrac- 
tion summarize individual objects or persons. They 
may relate wholly to groups of objects or persons, to 
collective acts and sentiments, to those habits and 
usages which are called institutions, to general causes 
that act in history. A slave we can image, but what 
was the " Slave Power" in America? Groans we have 
no doubt heard, but what is " a groan from the heart of 
France"? Opinions we have no doubt expressed, but 
what is "public opinion"? How shall we represent to 
ourselves a panic, a revolution, the church, the state, 
society itself and the laws of social action? 

The simplest problems in dealing with history are 
evidently those connected with forming conceptions of 
how the world and its activities looked in the past. 
The more difficult problems are those connected with 
forming conceptions of past mental states^. ► Particular 
facts, whatever their type, are simpler than general 






THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 45 

facts of the same type. There is, moreover, a certain 
kind of dependence of the higher upon the lower forms of 
representation. External material conditions and activ- 
ities, to the extent that they were either cause or effect 
of past mental states, furnish necessary clues to the inter- 
pretation of past mental states ; particular facts furnish 
necessary clues to the interpretation of general facts. 

In the field of external conditions and activities any- 
thing that can either be observed directly or be so pre- 
sented as to supply elements for definite imagery is ob- 
viously possible material for any stage of instruction. 
Children in the first grade of the elementary school can, 
given the proper kind of presentation, image primitive 
dwellings, primitive furniture, primitive tools, primitive 
weapons, primitive men, and the actions of primi- 
tive men. They can also, given the same kind of presen- 
tation, image dwellings, furniture, tools, weapons, men, 
and actions of men, in any degree of removal from prim- 
itive conditions. The time exposure needed for imagery 
increases of course with the amount of detail to be 
imaged. It is in general greater for the material aspects 
of the higher civilization than for the material aspects 
of the lower civilization. But given the time, and given 
the same kind of presentation, the material aspects both 
of the higher and of the lower civilizations are within 
the realm of the possible for children. 



46 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

In the field of thoughts and feelings the range of 
possible selection is still largely determined by the mode 
of presentation. Thoughts and feelings directly and 
obviously related to external conditions and activities 
that can themselves either be observed directly or be so 
presented as to supply elements for definite imagery are 
at any stage of the elementary school within the pupil's 
power to interpret. The feeling of need for a fire or of 
food for a dinner, the joy of accomplishment in fishing 
or hunting, the desire to visit a friend or to shun an 
enemy, the thought of the next day's work or adventure, 
in the presence of definite images of the thing needed, 
accomplished, desired, or thought of, all have a meaning 
for children of six. It is easy, however, at any stage of 
instruction to claim too much for the thoughts and feel- 
ings which pupils attribute to the past, and hence to 
demand too much. A pupil studying, for example, the 
Battle of Lexington, "must," we are informed, "com- 
pletely identify himself with the thought, passion, and 
resolution of the time." 1 The philosopher who said this 
began to doubt it in his next sentence, but the statement 
may stand as fairly representative of a kind of emphasis 
frequently met with in discussions of history teaching. 

The mental experiences with which children are thus 
expected to identify themselves are at the beginning of 

1 Tompkins, Philosophy of Teaching, 171. 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 47 

instruction usually those of primitive men. The sim- 
plicity alleged for such experiences is, however, largely a 
simplicity of conditions of presentation. The thoughts 
and feelings introduced are thoughts and feelings directly 
and obviously related to external conditions and activities 
that can themselves be presented concretely. Highly 
civilized men have thoughts and feelings similarly related 
to externals that can themselves be presented concretely. 
Are these less available? Is it easier to realize the ele- 
mental bodily sensations of a savage — hunger, thirst, 
cold, fatigue, toothache, headache — than to realize 
the elemental bodily sensations of a civilized man? Is 
it easier for country children to think the ordinary 
thoughts of a primitive farmer tilling the soil, gathering 
his crops, trading with his neighbors, grumbling about 
the weather, gossiping before his fire, than to think the 
ordinary thoughts of his most advanced successor simi- 
larly engaged ? Is it easier for city children to think the 
ordinary thoughts of some dweller in ancient Babylon 
than to think the ordinary thoughts of some dweller in 
modern New York ? The answer is that neither is suffi- 
ciently easy to make comparisons decisive. "Breath- 
ing the atmosphere of departed days," "catching the 
spirit of bygone times," and "living the past" are, even 
from the point of view of adults, in large part empty 
exaggerations. Applied in school to attempts at recon- 



48 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

struction of past mental states, whether of primitive or 
of highly developed human beings, such phrases are in 
large part suggestive of exercises in rhetoric for teachers 
rather than of exercises in history for children. 

Particular facts relating to external conditions and 
activities are plainly the A B C's of history. They are 
the facts most readily apprehended. They can without 
prohibitive strain on the intelligence be so treated as to 
bring out from the beginning differences in conditions 
and thus be made to illustrate the fundamental histori- 
cal idea of change in the world. They can be so selected 
as to cultivate from the beginning a sense of proportion. 
There is a temptation that is almost constant, in dealing 
with history for beginners, to build a past peopled only 
by the very fortunate and the very unfortunate, a past 
of palaces and prisons, of Fields of the Cloth of Gold, 
and Gallows Hills. History thus tends to become sen- 
sational and to mirror the past much as the "yellow" 
journals mirror the present. It is among the merits of 
the externals of normal human life in the past — build- 
ings, clothing, food, tools, roads, bridges, conveyances, 
weapons, occupations, amusements — that they are, as 
a rule, sufficiently different from those of the present to 
produce, without over-emphasis upon what is excep- 
tional and extreme, that effect of picturesqueness which 
is deemed essential in arousing the interest of pupils. 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 49 

This makes it possible to look in a serious way for facts 
that are really characteristic of former times and to seek 
in characteristic facts for the really characteristic ele- 
ments. Even the fundamental historical idea of conti- 
nuity can to some extent be illustrated. All that is nec- 
essary is to present action following action, to make the 
story of action a continuous story, to give it a beginning, 
a middle, and an ending, and to apply the same principle 
to a series of stories. Finally, external conditions and 
activities are the key to such mental experiences as are 
admissible for beginners. 

If the views here presented are correct, the general 
distinction between elementary history and more ad- 
vanced history is fairly clear. Elementary history is 
made up essentially of particular facts. It is history 
presented in the form of concrete examples — actual 
remains, physical representations of actual remains and 
of actions, verbal description rich in material for imagery. 
Advanced history is history presented in the form of 
general concepts. Concrete particulars relating to 
actions, actors, and the material world in which they 
acted can be introduced at least as early as the first year 
of the elementary school; general concepts relating to 
similar actions, similar actors, and a similar material 
world may be too difficult even for the high school. 
Concrete particulars can be so selected as to convey to a 



50 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

first grade measurably correct impressions of the past; 
general concepts may convey erroneous impressions 
even in the high school. Concrete particulars can be 
so treated as to illustrate to a first grade the fundamental 
historical ideas of change in the world and of continuity ; 
general concepts may fail to convey these ideas even in 
the high school. Similarly past mental states directly 
and obviously connected with concrete particulars can 
be understood by a first grade ; general concepts of simi- 
lar mental states may be meaningless even in the high 
school. 
-"J^-' The problem of adapting history to the schoolroom is, 
therefore, essentially a problem in presentation. Facts 
presented concretely are elementary; facts presented 
abstractly are advanced. For the earlier years of the 
elementary school, history should be made up essentially 
of concrete examples. It should be descriptive and 
narrative rather than analytical. Generalizations when 
introduced should be of a kind that can be readily re- 
solved into concrete particulars. This does not mean 
that history in the elementary school must be a series 
of pictures and that children should have no opportu- 
nity to reason, to generalize, and to apply their conclu- 
sions. It only means that the data for reasoning, for 
generalization, and for application must be concrete data. 
History thus constructed and thus presented for five or 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 5 1 

six years will lead naturally in the upper grades to history 
more largely made up of collective or general facts. 
With pupils of ten or eleven, concrete particulars must 
still be paramount ; with pupils of seventeen or eight- 
een, concrete particulars must still be continued, but 
discussion should and may turn largely on generalized 
history. 

One condition common to all historical facts, and one 
that presents a somewhat special problem, remains to be 
mentioned. Historical facts are localized facts. They 
belong to particular times and particular places. If these 
relations are suppressed, the facts cease to be historical. 
A fact may be localized in a general way : once upon a 
time, long ago, before we were born, on an island in the 
sea, in a far-away country, in the southern hemisphere. 
It may be localized in a more particular way : Columbus 
sailed from Spain in 1492 ; from Palos, Spain, in August, 
1492 ; from the bar of Saltes at eight o'clock, Friday, 
August 3, 1492. The degree of definiteness with which 
a fact should be localized depends upon a variety of 
considerations, some of which are quite arbitrary. Some- 
times an event is so famous that it is a part of common 
information to know when and where it happened. The 
event may not be really important, but that does not 
matter. Romulus Augustulus must have his 476 a.d. 
Sometimes historical characters must be kept where 



52 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

they belong to avoid embarrassment to grave conclu- 
sions. A St. Louis newspaper, some years ago, by put- 
ting Thomas Jefferson into the Convention of 1787 suc- 
ceeded in getting the Declaration of Independence into 
the Constitution. Just what events shall be localized 
very definitely and what events shall be localized in a 
general way only is a part of the larger question as to 
what facts really are significant in history. But local- 
ization itself is something more than an arbitrary de- 
vice, it is more than a convenience, it is a part of the 
very conception " historical." 

The time sense in children at the age of entering the 
elementary school is rudimentary. "Yesterday," "last 
week," "last month," "last summer," have a meaning. 
"One hundred years ago" has not. The sense develops 
slowly. Even children of twelve or thirteen often meas- 
ure short periods of time very vaguely. From this an 
argument is sometimes advanced that proves too much. 
"Twenty-five hundred years ago" is, it is urged, a useless 
expression anywhere in the elementary school. It can 
mean to children only "a long time ago." But that is 
about what it means to most of us even after we cease 
to be children. The argument against dating events in 
the distant past for children is, therefore, an argument 
against dating events in the distant past for most of 
their elders. With children, as with adults, the stand- 



THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 53 

ards for measuring the lapse of time must be the reach 
of their own memories, and this in either case is a vague 
standard. But by the age of ten or eleven even children 
have counted enough of days and experiences to realize 
the difference between the long ago to George Washing- 
ton and the long ago to Pericles sufficiently to justify the 
use of dates. 

The place sense in children at the age of entering the 
elementary school is also rudimentary. "Down town," 
"across the river," "up the road," have a meaning. 
"Five hundred miles away" often has not. Often all 
distances of more than a few miles are alike only "a 
long way off." But children learn comparatively early 
to read maps and, if accustomed from the first to visualize 
the material background of history, are in a position by 
the age of ten or eleven to deal with the place relation 
as they deal with the time relation. Before that age the 
teacher must often be content to have facts localized only 
in a general way. 

Within the limits that have here been outlined, history 
for school purposes can be whatever we desire. It can 
draw materials even from scientific history. It can 
from the beginning be of a nature to support and not, as 
is so often the case, to obstruct later historical study. 
The facts selected can from the beginning be in a true 
sense historical, in a true sense characteristic of places, 



54 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

persons, periods, peoples, and not exceptional, abnormal, 
bizarre. With proper attention to concreteness in 
presentation the facts can from the beginning be so pre- 
sented as to exhibit relations, cause and effect, conti- 
nuity ; they can from the beginning even be so presented 
as to arouse some consciousness of how we know what we 
know about the past and why we do not know more. 



CHAPTER III 

The Question of Aims and Values 

The aims of instruction determine for any subject 
the materials to be selected and the manner of dealing 
with them. The value of instruction is measured by 
the results of instruction. The two should not be 
confused. Worthy aims are easy to formulate and 
the logic of their realization is easy to establish. Worthy 
results are, therefore, easily accepted as foregone con- 
clusions. In this way any subject can be proved val- 
uable. History alone can be proved almost equal to 
the task of regenerating the world. The problem un- 
fortunately is not so simple. Worthy aims may or may 
not be followed by worthy results. 

The formulation of aims of instruction admits of two 
general modes of procedure. We may begin by asking 
what the various branches of learning stand for as 
branches of learning and what each, within the limits im- 
posed by the conditions of school life, can do or be 
for the individual or for society. We may use the an- 
swers as a basis for estimating the total possibilities of 
instruction. We may then differentiate, by reference 

55 



56 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

to human need, the more desirable possibilities from the 
less desirable, and select as controlling aims the most 
desirable. Or we may begin with an examination of 
the needs of the individual or of society, we may define 
in terms of these needs the aims of instruction, and then 
seek in the various branches of learning the materials 
and treatment appropriate thereto. 

The distinction may seem one without a difference. 
In either case, account must be taken both of human 
knowledge and of human need. But there is a real dif- 
ference between an open-minded search to discover what 
a branch of learning is good for and a search guided by 
a fixed purpose to make that branch of learning serve 
some predetermined good. The one implies a certain 
respect for the integrity of a branch of learning, for its 
materials, its methods, its conclusions, its organization ; 
the other implies a liberty of selection, of rearrangement, 
of revision, of transformation, the exercise of .which may, 
from the point of view of specialists in that branch of 
learning, lead to acts suggestive of a species of pedagogi- 
cal vandalism. The one mode of procedure does not 
necessarily exclude the other. The results are not 
necessarily two sets of aims in conflict with each other. 
What a branch of learning is good for may be to serve a 
predetermined good. Usually, however, the two modes 
of procedure do yield results more or less at variance 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 57 

with each other, and often the predetermined good 
involves for a branch of learning the kind of reconstruc- 
tion that has been indicated. 

History has, perhaps, to a greater extent than any 
other subject in the school curriculum been shaped by 
predetermined good. The historians themselves set the 
fashion. With Herodotus, who probably never asked 
himself what history is good for, the predetermined good 
was the entertainment of his public. With Thucydides 
a more distinctive good appeared. He discovered that 
history could be useful, that it could supply lessons of 
practical value for statesmen and military commanders. 
For many centuries, as we have seen, historians fol- 
lowed, consciously or unconsciously, the examples set 
by Herodotus and Thucydides. They selected facts 
either because they promised to be interesting or because 
they promised to be useful. But each age has its own 
special interests and problems. Each age has its own 
special questions. History as a form of entertainment 
or as a collection of practical lessons naturally changes, 
therefore, with the age which it is called upon to satisfy. 
It has for this reason been declared one of the most ephem- 
eral of all forms of literature. The history of the world 
must, it is said, be written anew in each generation. 
Even scientific history reflects the special interests and 
problems of. the age in which it is written. 



58 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

It is entirely natural and proper that the educator 
should ask his own questions. It is entirely natural and 
proper that his interest should be in the uses of a subject 
rather than in the subject itself. The subordination of 
history to the uses of history calls for special comment 
only because the degree of subordination appears to be 
exceptional. 

For most subjects the aims of instruction, however 
determined, agree at least in a recognition of the prin- 
l ciple that what is taught as truth in the schoolroom 
should be found true also in the world beyond the school- 
| room. History is one of the exceptions. Historical 
truth, if taken seriously, suggests historical science, and 
the road to historical science is, for many educators, 
barred at the outset by the culture-epoch theory or some 
other theory. Aims for instruction may, therefore, be 
set up without much regard to the question of what 
history really is, for, as was pointed out in the first 
chapter, history that is not scientific may be any repre- 
sentation or misrepresentation that has for its subject 
the past. The same theories are, to be sure, applicable 
to other subjects, and are, in some cases, so applied as to 
bar in the same way the road to what expert opinion now 
holds to be true. In most cases they are not so ap- 
plied. If, for example, those who accept the theory that 
the child must begin where the race began should under- 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 59 

take to teach beginners primitive arithmetic, or primitive 
geography, or primitive spelling, the plan would at once 
be pronounced absurd. Why it should be less absurd 
for history is not altogether clear. It might be argued 
on general principles that here, as elsewhere, the way 
to future progress in the study should not be im- 
peded by unnecessary misconceptions and by erroneous 
habits, indulged because the race once had them. It 
might be urged that it is bad economy for pupils to 
learn in the early stages of instruction a kind of history 
that must be unlearned later when realities begin to 
press for explanation and action. To many, however, 
it seems a sufficient answer that the passing need of the 
educational moment is paramount, and that children, 
after all, outgrow their early history lessons much as 
they outgrow their Santa Claus. 

An enumeration of the various aims actually proposed 
for historical instruction may seem at first a denial of 
any large or exceptional freedom in dealing with history. 
What are the aims commonly proposed? To discipline 
the memory, the imagination, the judgment; to teach 
the nature of historical evidence and to fix the habit of 
weighing historical evidence ; to give training in the use 
of books ; to furnish entertainment ; to set up for con- 
scious imitation ideals of conduct, of patriotism, of 
social service ; to inculcate practical knowledge that 



60 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

can be turned to account in the daily concerns of life ; 
to illuminate other studies, especially geography and 
literature; to cultivate a discriminating taste for his- 
torical reading; to enrich the humanity of the pupil, 
enlarge his vision, incline him to charitable views of his 
neighbors, give him a love for truth, make him, in gen- 
eral, an intelligent, well-disposed citizen of the world as 
it is by making him a citizen of the ages. 

Several of these aims appear to be specifically related 
to scientific history. Reasonably interpreted all of 
them might conceivably point to scientific history. But 
when we turn from bare enumeration to current dis- 
cussion of these various aims the situation becomes at 
least confused. "In support of virtue and in rebuke of 
vice," it is said, "the lessons of history are absolutely 
independent of time. Freed from chronology, the near 
and the remote may become equally potent in the life 
of the child." 1 This is very interesting, but is it his- 
tory at all ? Can history in any sense be taught without 
clear distinctions between past and present? "We 
must discriminate," it is urged, "between historic and 
poetic truth; between history and poetry or fiction." 
But, " as to the names of the characters selected to typify 
and illustrate" the truth of history, and, "as to the 
literal accuracy of the incidents that may be associated 

1 Educational Review, IX, 470. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 6 1 

with these characters, it matters little." * We must 
teach, it is said, the nature and value of historical evi- 
dence. We must also, it appears, carefully exclude 
historical criticism because children cannot understand 
it and because it is, after all, the spirit of the past that 
is to be sought rather than its bald facts. Besides, criti- 
cism may easily spoil the moral value of historical anec- 
dotes and interfere with the appreciation of literature. 
Such contradictions and inconsistencies could scarcely 
arise in discussions of a subject with any rights which 
pedagogy is bound to respect. There is, it is true, 
frequent complaint that the educator has not taken 
full advantage of his freedom. Pedagogical principles 
are, it is said, " greatly vitiated by the desire to 
preserve chronological continuity and to treat history 
as a unity," 2 by the desire, that is, to present history 
in school with some regard for modern conceptions of 
history. But, if the freedom itself did not exist, edu- 
cators would scarcely be arguing for the suppression of 
a lingering desire to keep historical instruction historical. 
Again, some of the aims that have been enumerated 
are so general as to be applicable, not only to any kind 
of history, but to any kind of study. History may 
afford exercise for the memory, but so too may any other 

1 Gordy and Twitchell, Pathfinder in American History, Part I, 6. 

2 Journal of Pedagogy, XIX, 266. 



62 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

study that requires memorizing. Indeed, history, as 
often taught in the United States, may afford less of. this 
kind of exercise than some other subjects. So much has 
been said in our time about mere memorizing in his- 
tory that some teachers feel the need of apologizing for 
any evidence in their classes of such old staples as reigns 
of sovereigns and presidential administrations. With 
these have largely disappeared also exact memories of 
other "mere facts." Possibly greater emphasis upon 
the discipline of memory as an aim in the teaching of 
history is desirable, but the aim cannot be said to be 
peculiar to history. Nor can the exercise of the imagi- 
nation be held in any more special sense an aim peculiar 
to history. To put one's self in the place of a person 
who lived a thousand years ago, or everi a hundred, or 
fifty years ago, to call the past to life even in its most 
commonplace aspects, to experience even a slight sense 
of reality in reading history, is work for the imagination. 
But so also is the attempt to put reality into the content 
of numerous other subjects. Entertainment, inspira- 
tion, ideals of life and conduct, may no doubt with profit 
be sought in history, but they may also with profit be 
sought in other subjects, and, indeed, if history is taken 
at all seriously, with even greater profit. This is ad- 
mitted, at least tacitly, by those who fill the history 
program with myth, romance, and poetry. It is some- 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 63 

times openly conceded by advocates of more serious 
history. "We no longer go to history," writes M. 
Seignobos, "for lessons in morals, nor for good examples 
of conduct, nor yet for dramatic nor picturesque scenes. 
We understand that for all these purposes legend would 
be preferable to history, for it presents a chain of causes 
and effects more in accordance with our ideas of justice, 
more perfect and heroic characters, finer and more 
affecting scenes." x 

The importance of history is, of course, not to be 
discounted merely because it shares with other subjects 
certain desirable aims. The place of history in the cur- 
riculum should, however, be made dependent primarily 
upon aims which can either be realized in no other way 
than through historical instruction, or which can be 
realized through historical instruction in a higher degree 
than through any other kind of instruction. The pur- 
suit of aims of this special character may reasonably be 
expected to promote at the same time other and more 
general aims, but the latter should be regarded as inci- 
dental, and not as equally controlling, if there is to be 
any distinctive argument for history. The fact that this 
condition, with its plain implication of a distinctive 
conception of history, has not, in general, been clearly 
grasped may furnish occasion for discounting the impor- 

1 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Sktdy of History, 331. 



64 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

tance of history. Indeed, the indiscriminate listing of all 
the claims that can be made for all conceptions of his- 
tory, so common in educational discussions and, to care- 
less readers, so suggestive of proof that history is good for 
almost everything, may raise in the minds of thoughtful 
readers a suspicion that history is good for nothing at all. 

A distinctive argument for history implies distinctive 
aims, and distinctive aims imply a distinctive conception 
of history. Some educational critics are sufficiently 
aware that distinctive aims have not been formulated ; 
they do not appear to see that, for history as they usually 
conceive it, no such aims can be formulated. A subject 
that is called upon so generally to be different things 
for different purposes — now a truthful record and 
explanation of past conditions and events, now purely 
imaginative literature, now applied sociology, now prac- 
tical ethics — can scarcely be expected to have distinc- 
tive, or even consistent, controlling aims. Even such 
aims as may properly claim to be peculiar to history — 
a certain kind of discipline for the judgment, an under- 
standing of the nature and value of historical evidence, 
a taste for historical reading — naturally lose much of 
their force when thus proclaimed merely as features of 
a shifting program that may take account of them one 
moment and eliminate them the next. 

Indefiniteness and inconsistency in discussions of 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 65 

aims naturally have their counterpart in discussions of 
values. The relation between aims and values is logi- 
cally so intimate that, as already suggested, results 
desired may easily come to be viewed as results actually 
obtained. This step is taken so generally in educational 
discussions of history that the difference between the 
treatment of aims and the treatment of values is reduced 
practically to a difference in phraseology. One writer 
announces as an aim of historical instruction the train- 
ing of the judgment. Another announces as a value of 
historical instruction the training of the judgment. The 
second may have in mind observed results ; usually he is 
expressing only a more or less logical conviction that histor- 
ical instruction ought to train the judgment. For a list of 
the values commonly attributed to history it is sufficient, 
therefore, to refer to the list of aims already set forth. 

The value of historical instruction has, however, 
been questioned both on the ground that it does, and on 
the ground that it does not, lead to tangible results. A 
critic, some years ago, after observing the interest mani- 
fested by a certain group of children in their history 
lessons, openly deplored the condition. "You are spoil- 
ing those children for life in the present," he said, "by 
making them think so much of the past." It was essen- 
tially this idea that possessed Nietzsche when, forty years 
ago, he set forth in an essay the good and evil — chiefly 



66 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the evil — of historical study. Animal life, according 
to Nietzsche, is unhistorical. It knows neither yester- 
day nor to-day. There are no representations of past 
conditions to interfere either with its freedom or with 
its pleasures. There is nothing to conceal. All is en- 
tirely in and of the immediate present. All is, there- 
fore, just what it appears to be, all is honorable. Hu- 
man life is restricted, bent, and twisted by the ever 
increasing burden of the past. Children, like animals, 
are happy until they begin to understand the signifi- 
cance of "it was." The condition of their happiness 
later is to forget that anything was. He who cannot 
forget can never know what happiness is and, still worse, 
can never do anything to make others happy. The 
historical and unhistorical states of mind are both 
essential to the welfare of an individual, a people, or a 
culture, but there is a kind of historical sense that im- 
pairs, and at last destroys, what is really life, whether 
the life of an individual, a people, or a culture. It is 
utterly wrong to be ungrateful to the past, blind to 
experience, deaf to example, to exist as a tiny living eddy 
in a dead sea of night and oblivion, and yet no artist 
can paint his picture, no general can win his victory, 
no nation can attain its freedom, without lapsing for the 
moment into an utterly unhistorical state of mind. 
Luther, according to Nietzsche, once expressed the 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 67 

opinion that the world itself had come into existence in 
a moment of forgetfulness, for if God had thought of 
"Schwere Geschutz," he would not have created the 
world. The historical state of mind is opposed to origi- 
nality of character. It is at best for strong personalities. 
Under its influence weak personalities lose their plastic 
force and are obliterated. They suffer from it as from 
a disease. All of us suffer. One of the great maladies 
of our time is historitis. 1 

Similar sentiments have been expressed more recently. 
They form a natural creed for futurists of divers per- 
suasions, past and present. "My heart beats for Italy," 
one of the apostles of futurism is reported to have said 
in an interview in 1910. "Our national life is strangled 
by the grip of the dead hand. We are not allowed to 
move forward according to the modern necessities of life 
because the way is blocked by the old monuments, the 
old statues, the crumbling old ruins, and the romantic 
old sentiments which encumber our people." 2 

School instruction in history may no doubt tend at 
times to promote absorption in and by the past to a de- 
gree that is undesirable, may tend to inspire a devotion 
that is excessive, may actually cultivate to some extent 

1 Vom Nutzen und Nachtheil der Eistorie filr das Leben, Nietzsche's 
Werke, II, 103-208. See especially pp. 108, no, in, 113, 132, 148, 
and 202. 

2 New York Times, December 25, 1910. 



68 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

that "exaggerated respect for past ages" which Buckle 
pronounced the most harmful of all ways of distorting 
truth. 1 The general practice in most countries, at least 
in the earlier stages of instruction, is to idealize the past, 
especially the national past, to invest it with the glamour 
of a golden age, to impress the legend that "there were 
giants in those days." Such a procedure may at times 
invite comparison between the past and the present so 
unfavorable to the latter as to make the outlook upon 
it one of hopeless pessimism rather than of helpful 
patriotism. It may at other times invite imitation of 
giants of old to a degree highly inexpedient in the 
present. There are, however, to-day numerous counter- 
acting tendencies. We are reminded so often "of our 
immense superiority over our comparatively ignorant 
forefathers," 2 that our age appears on the whole to be 
suffering not so much from "exaggerated respect for 
past ages" as from "exaggerated respect" for itself. 
Indeed, in the opinion of a modern poet, the past has 
already been consigned to oblivion. 

"The old times are dead and gone and rotten; 
The old thoughts shall never more be thought ; 
The old faiths have failed and are forgotten, 
The old strifes are done, the fight is fought." 3 

1 History of Civilization in England, I, 96. 

2 Alfred Russell Wallace, The Wonderful Century, 1. 

3 Sir Lewis Morris, quoted by Wallace, p. x. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 60 

The other ground on which the value of school instruc- 
tion in history has been questioned is that the results 
desired are realized in too slight a degree to be valuable. 
It is admitted that the instruction, especially in some 
European countries, yields a certain amount of fairly 
definite information. But what kind of training does the 
pupil receive ? What does he do, what can he do, with 
the information? 

The process of making up our minds about the char- 
acter and acts of men in the past prepares, it is said, in 
a special way for the process of making up our minds 
about the character and acts of men in the present. 
"He who has learnt to understand the true character 
and tendencies of many succeeding ages," says Lecky, 
"is not likely to go far wrong in estimating his own." l 
To this it may be objected that school judgments are 
either ready-made judgments of the teacher or the 
textbook, which give the pupil no training in judging 
for himself, or, if independent, are usually based upon 
data from which the disturbing factors that make our 
problem in judging the character and acts of men in 
the present are accommodatingly absent. To most 
persons of average education a judgment of Thomas 
Jefferson is simple and sure because they know so little 
about him, while a judgment of Theodore Roosevelt is 

1 Lecky, Political Value of History, 21. 



70 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

difficult and uncertain because they know so much 
about him. Ordinary school history scarcely supplies 
data sufficient to exercise the judgment in the way called 
for by data relating to the present. Even for those who 
have "learnt to understand the true character and tend- 
encies of many succeeding ages" the evidence is not 
altogether conclusive. It is notorious that expert 
historians differed almost as widely as laymen in esti- 
mating "the true character and tendencies" of the 
presidential campaign of 191 2. 

Historical knowledge is, it is said, practical knowl- 
edge; it is "philosophy teaching by example"; it is 
"the lamp of experience" pointing the way to action in 
the present. This is one of the oldest and one of the 
most familiar of all claims for the value of historical 
instruction. One kind of objection to it was set forth 
by Herbert Spencer in his well-known essay on Educa- 
tion. Spencer found "the historic information com- 
monly given" in his day "almost valueless for pur- 
poses of guidance." Most of the facts contained, not 
only in "school histories," but even in "the more elab- 
orate works written for adults," seemed to him "facts 
from which no conclusions can be drawn — unorganiz- 
able facts; and therefore facts which can be of no 
service in establishing principles of conduct, which is 
the chief use of facts. Read them, if you like, for 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 7 1 

amusement ; but do not flatter yourself they are in- 
structive." * There is another kind of objection. "The 
conditions under which human actions are performed 
are," it is said, "rarely sufficiently similar at two 
different moments for the 'lessons of history' to be 
directly applicable." 2 

It would not be difficult to furnish illustrations 
of this questioning attitude in the treatment of other 
claims for the educational value of history. The 
challenge sometimes extends so far as to leave his- 
tory an essentially useless subject. One of the last 
places to look for skepticism of a pronounced kind 
would be, perhaps, a school history. Yet a present- 
day English author has actually accomplished the re- 
markable feat of writing an excellent school history 
without convincing himself that the subject treated 
is really worthy of serious study. "For English his- 
tory," he remarks in the preface, "as part of a school 
curriculum or as a means of education I have no regard 
at all." 3 

The discussion of aims and values in the teaching of 
history is largely speculative. It is frequently based 
upon data furnished by mere assertion. This is perhaps 

1 Spencer, Education, A. L. Burt Edition, 56, 59. 

2 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 319. 

3 Fletcher, Introductory History of England. 



72 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

inevitable. But some of the confusion at least is avoid- 
able. History made over for one purpose becomes one 
kind of history; history made over for a conflicting 
purpose becomes another kind of history. The value of 
historical instruction, whatever that value may be, 
depends upon the kind of history. Educational discus- 
sion ought at least to recognize the difference in kind 
and not confuse the fruits of one with the fruits of the 
other. "Of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a 
bramble bush gather they grapes." One aim or set of 
aims may lead to simple, uncritical history. So be it. 
Let us then define aims and values in terms of that type 
and not claim for it the virtues of critical, more highly 
organized history. Another aim or set of aims may 
lead to critical, more highly organized history. So be 
it. Let us then define aims and values in terms of that 
type and not claim for it the virtues of mere story-telHng 
history. 

The question of aims and values in the teaching of 
uncritical history opens a field so vague and so changing 
that summary statements inevitably lead to confusion. 
Each must define the varying possibilities as they 
particularly appeal to his own sense of what is best. In 
the interest of clearness he should, however, recognize 
that he is dealing, not with history, but with kinds of 
history. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 73 

The question of aims and values in the teaching of 
critical, carefully organized history, history that may 
properly be called scientific, lends itself more easily to 
general treatment. The assumption here is that there 
is to be a real understanding of the past. If the past is 
not understood, the past can have no possible bearing 
on the present, and it is idle to talk of values at all. 
This is not to deny that representations of the past, 
even when incorrect, may have value. But to speak of 
that is at once to shift the ground to uncritical history. 
If the history that expert opinion now holds to be true 
is to have any value for school purposes, the history 
taught in school must, so far as it goes, be in harmony 
with expert opinion. This is to apply to history a prin- 
ciple already applied to other, subjects. Arithmetic, 
so far as it goes, aims to be arithmetic that may claim 
kinship with the conceptions of modern mathematicians ; 
geography, so far as it goes, aims to be geography 
that may claim kinship with the conceptions of modern 
geographers. On the same principle history, so far as 
it goes, should aim to be history that may claim kinship 
with the conceptions of modern historians. 

School instruction will inevitably lag behind in the 
pursuit of truth. " In the field of history," says Dr. 
Jameson, " the advancement of learning may be likened 
to the advance of an army. The workers in organized 






74 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

institutions of research must go before like pickets or 
scouting parties making a reconnaissance. Then, after 
some interval, comes the light cavalry of makers of doc- 
toral dissertations, then, the heavy artillery of writers 
of maturer monographs, both of them heavily encum- 
bered with ammunition trains of bibliography and 
footnotes. Then comes the multitudinous infantry of 
readers and college students and school children, and 
finally, like sutlers and contractors hovering in the rear, 
the horde of those that make textbooks. It may be 
twenty years before new facts discovered, or the elimi- 
nation of ancient errors, find place in the historical books 
prepared for the general reader." x If school history 
definitely aimed to be nearer the "heavy artillery," it 
might be less than twenty years behind. At all events, 
school history may definitely aim to be as near the 
"heavy artillery" as possible. Conceived in this 
spirit, history, while still a vast and varying field, as- 
sumes a form sufficiently distinctive to suggest for his- 
torical instruction distinctive, controlling aims and 
distinctive values. 

History of the scientific type is dominated, as we 

have seen, by the idea of development. From this point 

of view nothing either was or is ; everything either was 

or is in a continuous process of becoming. Here then is 

1 History Teacher's Magazine, IV, 36. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 75 

a conception that renders history not only unique 
but indispensable, and makes clear at once the most 
fundamental and the most comprehensive aim that| 
can be formulated for historical instruction, namely, 
to make the world intelligible. History is of course not 
everything. Natural science deals with the material 
world ; literature deals with the world of forms and 
ideas ; other branches of instruction deal with other 
special worlds. History for general purposes is a 
branch coordinate with these, revealing the social and 
political world. But natural science, literature, and the 
rest are themselves forms of development and as such 
not intelligible apart from their history. So generally 
is this recognized that specialists in every department 
of the vast domain of human knowledge now view their 
fields historically. History has itself a history essen- 
tial to an understanding of present conceptions of his- 
tory. 

The world to be made intelligible through school in- 
struction in history is the general social and political 
world. The more special forms of development enter 
only as they affect that world in general. The mode of 
procedure is obviously to exhibit successive societies in 
action, to convey by means of concrete examples defi- 
nite impressions of human beings, living together, com- 
manding one another, serving one another, reasoning 






76 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

with one another, going to war together, making peace, 
organizing a church, constructing a government, de- 
manding higher wages, protesting against laws, obeying 
or defying social conventions, seeking amusement — 
impressions, that is, of what society has been and is, 
how society works, and what the causes and conse- 
quences of social action are. Such may properly be the 
controlling aim of historical instruction, for it meets a 
fundamental human need and meets it in a way that 
only historical instruction can meet it. 

The demand thus made upon history may seem slight 
in comparison with the imposing list of other aims 
usually enumerated. In reality it is a demand that 
taxes the resources of history to the utmost and finds 
them not entirely adequate. It is also to be observed 
that historical instruction, aiming primarily to make 
the social world intelligible in a way unthinkable apart 
from history, involves attendant circumstances and 
consequences, important, not only in relation to the main 
purpose, but in relation to other purposes. 

In the first place, the facts must be historical, and 
must be recognized by the pupil as historical. This 
implies some consciousness of historical evidence and 
requires the introduction of exercises to develop that 
consciousness. 

In the second place, differences in peoples, customs, 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 77 

and institutions must be emphasized. History is occu- 
pied fundamentally with differences. If the present 
were not different from the past, there could be no his- 
tory. The conception of our own interests, problems, 
and standards of judgment as different from those of the 
past is a necessary step toward understanding our own 
interests, problems, and standards. In taking this step 
the mind acquires at the same time the larger vision that 
should dispel provincialism and may affect conduct. 

In the third place, the idea of change must be empha- 
sized. Development is change, and a changing social 
world can be made intelligible only by reference to ante- 
cedent changes. It is, perhaps, here that history makes 
its most luminous contribution and reaches its deepest 
significance, for it is here that the modern conception of 
progress comes into view. The idea of change itself is so 
simple and so constantly borne in upon us through the 
most familiar experiences of life that it may seem quite 
unnecessary formally to refer for illustration to history. 
Yet change is often dimly perceived even by those who 
have studied some history. The notion that we run, or 
should run, " the same course that our fathers have run" 
persists in spite of ever-accumulating evidence to the 
contrary. There are serious statesmen who measure 
the United States of 191 5 by the standards of 1789. 
History itself, as conceived by many of the older histo- 



78 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

rians, encouraged this view. The older historians were 
conscious of change, but many of them regarded change 
as recurring change. It was on the assumption that 
human affairs followed, as it were, in cycles or circuits, 
tracks which had been followed before, that history was 
believed to have practical value for life. There are still 
those who believe that history repeats itself, or at least 
that the general aim of school instruction should be to 
make history repeat itself. Development, as set forth 
by modern historians, renders such views no longer ten- 
able and puts in their place the far more inspiring view 
of progress widening indefinitely with " the process of 
the suns." The immediate effect upon the pupil of feel- 
ing that he is living in the midst of progress is to give him 
a better appreciation of the present and of the larger 
opportunity that awaits him in the future. The full 
import of this conception is only beginning to be felt. 
If history in tracing social development can make clear 
the nature of social progress, may progress not be taken 
in hand consciously and consciously assisted? That 
may in time come to be regarded as the ultimate and 
most valuable result of historical instruction. 1 

It may be objected that history designed primarily to 
make the social world intelligible is fatally defective for 
school purposes in that it appeals too much to the intel- 

1 Cf. Robinson, The New History, 251-252. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 79 

lect and too little to the emotions of childhood and youth. 
But this is to read social progress abstractly. The con- 
crete reality is not wanting in examples of heroism, of 
patience in suffering, of the victory of truth over error, 
of loving service and noble ideals, of righteousness exalt- 
ing a nation. It may be objected that there are positive 
dangers in seeking to make the social world really intelli- 
gible to children. The habit of judging different ages by 
standards peculiar to those ages may dull the sense of 
present moral values. It may lead to a toleration of 
customs which ought not in the light of our day to be 
tolerated. It may chill that pride of country which in the 
name of patriotism so generally and so deeply concerns 
historical instruction and leave the pupil with a general 
feeling that it is the most stupid thing in the world to 
pronounce one custom or institution or country either 
better or worse than another. The idea of ceaseless 
change and of indefinite progress may create merely the 
impression that whatever is in state, church, school, 
family, or occupation is temporary, that what is valu- 
able to-day may not be valuable to-morrow, and that 
there are no permanent values. 

Some of these possibilities are not so bad as they may 
appear, unless truth itself is bad, and the very idea of 
social progress carries its own antidote for others. It 
may be desirable, for example, that pride of country 



80 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

should, now and then, be chilled. When a textbook 
writer gravely announces that it is his purpose to make 
children see why Americans are " the bravest men and the 
most successful of inventors, explorers, authors, and 
scientists," there is need of a slightly lower temperature. 
Doubtless some pride of country is desirable, and there 
is no country that does not inspire it. Foreigners used 
to think that our country inspired it to an undue degree. 
De Tocqueville, observing conditions in the thirties, 
found that for fifty years there had been impressed upon 
Americans the idea that they were "the only religious, 
enlightened, free people." "They have," he wrote, "an 
immense opinion of themselves and they are not far from 
believing that they form a species apart from the human 
race." x Another Frenchman thought it must be a 
standing source of mortification to Americans "not to be 
able to pretend that an American discovered America." 2 
Bryce, in the eighties, found the old self-assertion only 
"faintly noticeable" and felt the change as a compliment 
to Americans. 3 Since then the " muck-raker " has made 
us perhaps too conscious of our faults, and our pride has 
been further sobered in other ways. But this condition, 
instead of being an argument, as is sometimes urged, for 

1 Quoted by Rhodes, History of the United States from the Compromise 
of 1850, III, 82. 

2 Ibid., Ill, 83. > Ibid., II, 610. 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 8 1 

idealizing the past, is rather an argument for treating the 
past as soberly as we treat the present, if we would avoid 
the unhistorical conclusion of degeneracy. As a matter 
of fact, neither the American past nor the American 
present, in any attempt at true characterization, can leave 
us cold. As for the standards of other ages and other 
countries, he is a poor patriot, whatever his training or 
lack of training in history and whatever his flag, who 
cannot to some extent sympathize with Max O'Rell's 
Englishman, who, on returning from France to his native 
soil, thanks God that he was born an Englishman, or with 
his Frenchman, who, on returning to his native soil, ex- 
claims, "How proud a man is to call himself a French- 
man after he has looked at England !" 

The facts selected to illustrate social progress and to 
make our own social world intelligible will naturally be 
those most immediately related to our own special inter- 
ests, problems, and standards of judgment. School time 
is precious and it has become almost an educational 
dogma that school history must exclude everything in 
the past which has not left traces sufficiently enduring 
to be found in the life of the present. There are, how- 
ever, difficulties in applying the principle. When a 
condition in ancient Greece is approached because it 
seems to throw light on a condition in modern America, 
we are at once confronted by the necessity of under- 



82 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

standing the Greeks to understand the condition in 
Greece. This introduces a series of facts some of which 
are likely to fall under suspicion on the ground of not 
being themselves directly related to the present. Nor 
is this all. The same facts are almost sure to create a 
need for other explanations, which must, perhaps, be 
sought outside of Greece itself. It was once a fashion to 
begin a history, of one's own time with an account of the 
creation of the world, and there is still something to be 
said in favor of the principle. Our main emphasis in 
America will naturally be upon modern history. But 
we cannot escape, if we really hope to make American 
society intelligible, the necessity of presenting "the 
principal transformations of humanity." 

Whatever the aim, or aims, set up for historical instruc- 
tion, the teacher must, most of the time, press onward 
consciously and definitely toward the goal. But the 
pursuit even of a great purpose should not be conceived 
in a narrow spirit. There ought still to be byways in 
which it is safe, now and then, to forget the everlasting 
pedagogical formula, "Turn everything to use," leisure 
to wander in quiet places praying only the prayer for 
truth, dreaming only of glories that have passed away 
from earth, feeling only the inspiration of vanished 
greatness; or, if faith in utility must go all the way, 
rising to the faith of Browning's Grammarian : 



THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 83 

"Earn the means first — God surely will contrive 

Use for our earning. 
Others mistrust and say, 'But time escapes ! 

Live now or never ! ' 
He said, 'What's time? Leave now for dogs and apes! 

Man has Forever.' " 

At the worst a little superfluous knowledge is not a 
dangerous thing, and even if it were, the wisest of edu- 
cators is unable to draw sharply the line between what 
is superfluous and what is not. There is danger, in this 
age of passion for immediate practical results, of for- 
getting that larger future which, in spite of utilitarian 
educational philosophers, is ever being shaped in the 
Grammarian's spirit. 

"Oh, if we draw a circle premature, 
Heedless of far gain, 
Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure 
Bad is our bargain ! " 



CHAPTER IV 

History in the School Curriculum in Europe 

History in some form has probably been a part of 
instruction since the earliest dawning of historical con- 
sciousness. There were peoples even in remote an- 
tiquity to whom the handing down of traditions from the 
old to the young appealed as a national duty. The ex- 
ample set by the ancient Hebrews is familiar and perhaps 
exceptional. Yet the spirit in which Joshua commanded 
twelve stones to be gathered as a memorial of the cross- 
ing of the Jordan and dictated the answer to be given 
when children in time to come should ask their fathers, 
"What mean ye by these stones ? " x has probably to some 
extent found expression among all peoples. 

With the emergence of history as a distinct branch of 
learning the step to more formal instruction in history 
might, therefore, have seemed natural and simple. But 
history early assumed a form that seemed to limit its 
utility. It became a professional subject. Princes 
studied it as a part of their preparation for the art of 
ruling ; captains studied it as a part of their preparation 
1 Joshua IV. 
84 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 85 

for the art of war ; men of letters studied it as a part of 
their preparation for the art of writing. Occupied, as it 
was, chiefly with affairs in which ordinary people had no 
directing voice, there could be little occasion for popular 
instruction in the subject, even assuming that ordinary 
people could understand it. There might be occasion 
for consciously discouraging historical instruction as a 
possible breeder of discontent and of disrespect for es- 
tablished authority. It was partly on this ground that 
the schools of the Middle Ages almost completely neg- 
lected history. It is partly on this ground that some 
rulers in church and state and some educators still object 
to certain kinds of history. 

The general character of the school curriculum from 
the closing centuries of the Middle Ages until well into 
the nineteenth century interposed another obstacle. 
Throughout this period the dominant type of school was 
the secondary school, which meant, in most cases, the 
Latin school. With Latin the language of learning there 
was much to be done before the pupil could really begin 
to study anything except the language itself. Latin 
alone made a crowded curriculum. With Greek added 
the outlook for non-linguistic studies was not improved. 
A certain amount of historical information radiated of 
course from the classical authors. It was, indeed, as an 
adjunct of these that history made its first important 



86 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

advance in the schools. As such it was used, however, 
to illustrate linguistic forms and the beauties of litera- 
ture rather than to give a knowledge of facts. Teachers 
themselves lacked the "historic sense," and it rarely 
occurred to them to view even literature historically. 
When schools for the people began to be common there 
was again the obstacle of a crowded curriculum. With 
defective systems of organization, defective apparatus, 
and defective methods of teaching, it was as much as 
the schoolmaster could do to manage the three R's. 

Thus it happened that while history was for centuries 
almost uniformly commended by men of the highest 
intelligence it was at the same time almost uniformly 
excluded from schemes for general school instruction. 
The commendation was for the few. For the many, 
history, if not considered unnecessary or unsuitable, was 
at least considered unavailable for lack of time. 

There were advocates of school instruction in history 
as early as the sixteenth century. Jacob Wimpheling, 
the humanist, in 1505 published a textbook on German 
history, Luther in 1524 argued that history should be 
taught, and the English Privy Council in 1582 actually 
ordered a manual of English history to be read in the 
schools. All of these had in view the secondary and not 
the elementary school. In the next century Comenius 
proposed that history should have a place in every 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 87 

grade of instruction from the "school of the mother's 
knee" up through the university and the " College of 
Light," an institution for research which was to follow 
the university. For the vernacular school of six classes, 
designed to enroll all children between the ages of six and 
twelve, as set forth in the Great Didactic, completed in 
1632, there was to be a general survey of world history. 
For the Latin school of six classes, designed to enroll boys 
of special promise between the ages of twelve and eight- 
een, the materials were to be grouped as follows : Class I, 
Epitome of Bible history; Class II, Natural history; 
Class III, History of arts and inventions ; Class IV, His- 
tory of morals ; Class V, History of the customs of differ- 
ent peoples ; Class VI, General history of the world, and 
especially of the pupil's own country. 1 

Comenius here clearly foreshadowed at least two im- 
portant features of the most advanced modern practice. 
He made provision for history in every year of the school 
course, and he included morals, customs, arts, and in- 
ventions, in a word, what the Germans call Kulturge- 
schichte, as well as politics and war. 

Ideas equally modern in spirit appeared in a work by 
Christian Weise, published in 1676, under the title, Der 
Kluge Hofmeister. In this work Weise set forth the 
history of Germany, Spain, France, England, Denmark, 

1 Comenii Magna Didactlca, Leipsic, 1894, pp. 213, 222. 



88 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Sweden, Poland, Italy, Turkey, and Switzerland, with an 
argument for emphasis upon modern rather than upon 
ancient history similar to arguments heard in our day, 
and with suggestions on methods of presentation that 
may still be read with profit. 1 

It was, however, rare as yet to find history actually 
taught. A few secondary schools in Germany had in- 
troduced the subject. The schools of the Oratorians 
in France had a well-defined course including Bible 
history and Greek, Roman, and French history. More 
remarkable still they had special teachers of history. 2 
But the total number of schools in which history was 
taught before the eighteenth century barely sufficed to 
make the subject a respectable exception in courses of 
study. 

The eighteenth century as the century first of "En- 
lightenment," then of the "Natural Man," and finally 
of revolution, developed much in the trend of its think- 
ing that either tacitly ignored, or consciously defied, his- 
tory. Its appeals to reason, its doctrines of sovereignty, 
of the social contract, and of the rights of man were a 
priori and unhistorical. Its grand climax of revolution, 
the French Republic of the Year I, was in appearance 
the culmination of an organized movement to abolish 

1 Pddagogisches Magazin, Heft 35, Langensalza, 1893, pp. 1-27. 

2 Compayre, Doctrines de I'Ediccation en France, I, 218. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 89 

history. Yet Rousseau himself prescribed history for 
his epoch-making Emile, though not until Emile had 
attained the age of eighteen, and then not the traditional 
kind of history. Francke was an advocate of the sub- 
ject and gave it a place in the Latin school, in the Padago- 
gium, and in the school for orphans, founded by him at 
Halle just before 1700. The subjects embraced Old 
Testament history, New Testament history, the Roman 
emperors, the political history of various peoples, the 
history of the church, and the history of learning. His 
plans for historical instruction did not include the ele- 
mentary school. 

Rollin praised history in his Traite des Etudes, com- 
pleted in 1 73 1, and then wrote a work on ancient history 
that was read and enjoyed by generation after generation 
almost down to our own. "History when well taught," 
declared Rollin, "is a school of morals for all men. It 
describes vice, it unmasks false virtue, it exposes errors 
and popular prejudices ; it dissipates the enchantment 
of riches and of all that vain pomp which dazzles men ; 
it shows by a thousand examples more persuasive than 
all arguments that there is nothing great and laudable 
except honor and uprightness." It should, then, be a 
part of the earliest instruction of children. It is equally 
fitted to amuse and to edify; it develops the intellect 
and the heart, it stores the memory with facts both pleas- 



90 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ing and useful; it gives a taste for study. 1 Similar 
sentiments were expressed by Barclay, a Scotchman, in 
his Treatise on Education, published in 1763. 

Frederick the Great was a friend and promoter of his- 
torical instruction. The famous General Regulations 
of 1763, providing for compulsory education between the 
ages of five and fourteen, enumerated history as one of 
the subjects to be taught. The instructions of 1765 to 
the Berlin Ritter Akademie contained the declaration 
that it was " no longer possible for a young man who is to 
live in the great world not to know the events which be- 
long to the chain of European history." The Elector 
of Saxony believed in history, and by a school ordinance 
in 1773 decreed that children in the elementary school 
should be taught " the simplest, the most necessary, and 
the most useful facts of world history, and especially of 
the history of Saxony." Basedow's Philanthropinum at 
Dessau, founded in 1774, under the inspiration of Rous- 
seau's Emile, had history in the program of studies. In 
the same year a new educational law in Austria made 
history one of the subjects for secondary schools. By 
the end of the eighteenth century the teaching of history 
had become fairly general in German secondary schools 
and had been introduced in a considerable number of 
elementary schools. Its position was, however, rather 

1 Traite des Etudes, Paris, 1884, II, 162-164. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 9 1 

commonly that of an extra or option without regular 
hours in the schedule of studies. 

In France, before the Revolution, history and geog- 
raphy were taught in connection with grammar and liter- 
ature and bore especially upon the authors read. The 
Revolution transferred emphasis to itself. Of the three 
stages of historical instruction proposed by the decree of 
1793, the first two stages were given up exclusively to 
the Revolution, and the third, while occupied with a 
general survey of different peoples, looked especially to 
perfecting through this survey French art and industry. 1 
But this plan did not become effective. In England 
history was scarcely taught at all. Rugby for a time 
offered to its upper classes a course consisting of Bible 
history and Roman and English history, but not as a 
regular part of the curriculum. 

The usual eighteenth century conception of history for 
schools was a general survey of the world, especially the 
ancient world. Bible history was taught for its ethical 
and religious significance. Other ancient history, with 
special attention to characters and events made famous 
by Greek and Roman writers, was taught partly for its 
ethical value, partly for the illumination of literature, 
and partly for general cultural ends. So little was 
thought of history as a possible aid to an understanding 

1 Pizard, L'Histoire dans V ' Enseignement Primaire, 11. 



92 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

of the present that the pupil's own country might easily 
be neglected. Rollin, for example, qualified his commen- 
dation of history by remarking that he was not speaking 
of the history of France. To that field he had himself 
devoted little attention. "I am ashamed," he confesses, 
" to be in a way a stranger in my own country, after hav- 
ing surveyed so many others." French history, he be- 
lieved, ought to be studied, but it seemed to him a natu- 
ral order to begin with ancient history, and there was not 
time in school for both. As a matter of fact some na- 
tional history was taught in France, but the instruction 
was ineffective. Rolland, twenty-five years after the 
death of Rollin, complained that young Frenchmen knew 
the names of all the consuls of Rome, but were often igno- 
rant of the names of the kings of France ; they were ac- 
quainted with the deeds of Themistocles and of Scipio, 
but were ignorant of those of Duguesclin, of Bayard, 
of Turenne, and of Sully. Rolland proposed to remedy 
this defect. He urged careful attention, not only to na- 
tional history, but to local history. 1 In Germany school 
regulations and the writings of educators in general laid 
stress upon national history, but here, as in France, 
ancient history seems to have held the chief place. At 
the opening of the nineteenth century a German could 

1 Kilian, Tableau Historique de V Instruction Secondaire en France, 
Paris, 1841, p. 56-57. 



L 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 93 

still ask, "Shall we go on knowing more about the 
history of Greece and of Rome than about the history 
of our own country?" * 

The facts selected for school history in the eighteenth 
century were largely political and military, and there was 
a tendency to reduce them to bare names and dates. 
German programs and textbooks, however, began, es- 
pecially toward the close of the century, to include an 
appreciable amount of Kulturgeschichte. Both materials 
and treatment felt to some extent the influence of Rous- 
seau. "All our histories," said Rousseau, "begin 
where they ought to end." They are concerned with 
revolutions and catastrophies, with people in their decay. 
"We know, then, only the bad; the good hardly forms 
an epoch. It is only the wicked who attain celebrity; 
the good are forgotten or turned to ridicule ; and this is 
how history, like philosophy, ever calumniates the human 
race. Moreover, the facts described in history are very 
far from being the exact portraiture of facts as they really 
happen ; they change form in the head of the historian ; 
they are molded in accordance with his interest and 
take the tint of his prejudices." Historians who judge 
are not the historians for a young man. "Facts ! facts ! 
Supply him with these and let him form his own judg- 
ments. It is in this way that he learns to know men." 

1 Reim, Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts, 186. 



94 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

The true model is Thucydides, but, unfortunately, "he 
is always speaking of wars." What is needed is a treat- 
ment, in the spirit and with the accuracy of Thucydides, 
of facts neglected by historians, especially facts relating 
to individual men, not "at certain chosen moments and 
on dress parade," but in their ordinary, everyday person. 
Above all, facts must be presented concretely. 1 Some of 
these ideas Basedow and his fellow Philanthropinists 
undertook to apply. Basedow emphasized particularly 
the need of correct visualization and introduced carefully 
prepared pictures of historic places and incidents. Salz- 
mann suggested learning the history of one's own neigh- 
borhood before proceeding to the history of the Assyrians 
and Persians, Greeks and Romans. Bahrdt protested 
against that dry skeleton of universal history which 
merely fills the memory with dates and names without 
stimulating the mind to think or the heart to feel, and 
demanded details for dramatic, lifelike presentation. 
But history for schools remained for the most part a mere 
outline of political and military events. 2 

In the nineteenth century, school instruction in history 
was advocated by practically all important writers on 
education. The most notable exceptions were Herbert 

1 Emile, Payne's Translation, Appleton, ion, p. 213-215. 

2 For history teaching in Germany in the age of the Aufklarung, see 
Julius Gallandt, Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Geschichts-Unterrichts im 
Zeitalter der deulschen Aufklarung, Berlin, 1900. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 95 

Spencer and Alexander Bain. Spencer's opinion has 
already been cited. 1 In the opinion of Bain, " the fact 
that history presents no difficulty to minds of ordinary 
education and experience, and is, moreover, an interest- 
ing form of literature, is a sufficient reason for not spend- 
ing much time upon it in the curriculum of school or 
college. Where there is any doubt, we may settle the 
matter by leaving it out." 2 Teachers and school admin- 
istrators sometimes objected to history. When, for 
example, in the course of a general inquiry concerning the 
state of elementary instruction in France, in 1863, in- 
spectors were asked to specify subjects that should be 
obligatory, fourteen excluded history. "Instruction in 
history," said one, "is impossible. It is as much as an 
ordinary teacher can do to teach reading, writing, and 
ciphering." "Instruction in history," said another, "is 
useless. Those who know how to read can read history 
for themselves." "Instruction in history," said another, 
" is injurious. It is likely to inspire children with a foolish 
vanity, prejudicial alike to individual happiness and to 
the repose of society." 3 But such objections were com- 
paratively rare. Both theorists and practitioners, while 
frequently criticising the kind of history that was taught, 

1 See above, p. 70. 

2 Bain, Education as a Science, 286-287. 

3 Pizard, L'Histoire dans V Enseignement Primaire, 26. 



96 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

or the manner of teaching it, agreed in general, and have 
agreed down to the present, that history ought to be 
taught. 

At the opening of the century history began to be defi- 
nitely enlisted in the service of patriotism, and attention 
turned in consequence distinctly to national history. 
The patriotic conception was by no means novel. It 
had been suggested by Wimpheling in his textbook of 
1505. It had moved the English Privy Council to the 
action of 1582. It had been in the minds of Comenius 
and of Rolland. It had inspired the French proposals 
of 1793. "Especially the history of the Fatherland" 
had again and again appeared in school programs for 
history. But it remained for the new patriotism of the 
nineteenth century and the new need felt by rulers for 
popular support to make the conception really effective. 
The history of the Fatherland, declared Riedel, in sub- 
stance, must be taught in all our schools ; it must have 
a place in our universities ; patriotic men must unceas- 
ingly speak of it, to the end that love and reverence for 
existing institutions may be inculcated. No branch of 
public affairs must be intrusted to men who do not appre- 
ciate the history of their own country. Then will history 
live in the people and the people will live on in history. 
Riedel was a Prussian and spoke with the authority of 
historical scholarship. Gedicke, a schoolmaster of Leip- 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 97 

sic, was equally emphatic : "The history of the Father- 
land deserves the first place." Kohlrausch went a step 
farther and made patriotic history an accomplished fact. 
His German History for Schools, published in 1816, re- 
ceived immediately the compliment of extended use and 
became the model for a multitude of textbooks both 
elementary and advanced. In it spoke the spirit so 
powerfully stimulated, first by defeat and then by 
victory, in the conflict with Napoleon. Battles and the 
doings of royalty constituted its substance. German 
patriotism tended, however, to assume the form of par- 
ticularism. The Fatherland was not one ; it was many, 
divided in interest and sentiment. Before long "every 
duodecimo state wanted its own glorious history, which 
must, so far as possible, be older and more glorious 
than that of the Hohenzollern." l 

In France, by the program of 1802 for secondary 
schools, French history and geography were placed on an 
equal footing with ancient history. The program for 
elementary schools had, during the Napoleonic regime, 
no history at all, but that there was a certain kind of 
popular historical instruction is indicated by a Catechism 
for Use in All the Churches of the French Empire, pub- 
lished in 1806. This catechism, after enumerating the 
duties of Christians toward their ruler, continues : 

1 Reim, Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts , 186-187. 



98 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

"Question. Are there not special motives that ought 
to attach us more strongly to Napoleon I, our Emperor ? 

"Answer. Yes, for it is he whom God has raised up 
at a critical time to reestablish the holy religion of our 
fathers and to be its protector. He has restored and 
conserved public order by his profound and ever active 

wisdom and defends the State with his powerful arm. 

" 1 

The spirit here illustrated is said to have been re- 
flected, though not without protest, even in the univer- 
sity. 

The downfall of Napoleon furnished both the occasion 
and the opportunity for the development of patriotic 
history in the schools of most of the countries of Europe. 
Patriotism became in fact the dominant purpose of school 
instruction in history, and is, in most countries, still the 
dominant purpose. Patriotism meant, first of all, loyalty 
to king or prince. But it meant also a character and 
spirit shaped by national ideals. The Prussian was to 
be made more Prussian, the Bavarian more Bavarian, 
the Austrian more Austrian, the Frenchman more 
French. As the century advanced the effect was seen in 
the framing of elementary history programs devoted 
almost exclusively to national history. It was of course 
scarcely possible to teach the history of any European 

1 Pizard, L'Histoire dans V Enseignement Primaire, 14, 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 99 

country without some reference to general European 
conditions, but the latter were, as a rule, reduced to the 
lowest possible minimum and used chiefly for the eluci- 
dation or glorification of national or local history. In 
secondary schools ancient history continued to be im- 
portant. If it was wise to devote substantially half of the 
total instruction hours to Greek and Latin, it could not 
be unwise to devote some hours to the history of Greeks 
and Romans. But the history of the Fatherland received 
a new emphasis. It was in some cases the point toward 
which all other history was made to converge. It was 
in all cases at least recognized. Bible history commonly 
remained both in elementary and in secondary schools, 
but it was often classed with religious rather than with 
historical instruction. 

The history of the Fatherland for the elementary 
school, general history, with special reference to the his- 
tory of the Fatherland, for the secondary school, consti- 
tuted a natural apportionment of fields. 1 The distinc- 
tion in Europe between the two kinds of schools is not, 
as in the United States, a distinction merely between 
lower and higher grades of instruction. Schools classed 
as elementary in Europe may include subjects and grades 
of instruction which belong with us to the high school ; 

1 The use here made of the terms " elementary " and " secondary " is 
objectionable, but no better terms seem to be available. 



IOO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

schools classed as secondary may include subjects and 
grades of instruction which with us belong to the ele- 
mentary school. Secondary schools in Europe are not, 
that is, as with us, schools superimposed upon elementary 
schools. The distinction between them is social. Each 
has a field peculiar to itself ; each is a unit for the con- 
struction of programs. The public elementary school 
is the people's school. It provides the compulsory min- 
imum of free instruction and a varying amount of addi- 
tional free instruction. Public secondary schools, while 
supported by taxation, usually charge tuition fees and 
are intended for the selected few. They are institutions 
of general culture alike for those who do, and for those 
who do not, expect to go to the university, and to the 
professions for which university training is essential. 
The preparatory work of the first three or four years can 
be done in the public elementary school. Usually it is 
done either in special schools or in special preparatory 
classes attached to secondary schools. The full course 
in boys' secondary schools is commonly completed at 
about the age of eighteen and leaves the pupil at about 
the point where American colleges leave him at the end 
of the sophomore year. The full course for girls' second- 
ary schools is as a rule, less comprehensive and is com- 
monly completed at the age of seventeen. Until late in 
the century state-supported secondary schools existed for 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE IOI 

boys alone. Girls were excluded. Provision for their in- 
terests was left to private schools and to local initiative. 
The elementary school in Europe commonly takes 
account of the pupil up to the age of thirteen or fourteen, 
sometimes up to the age of sixteen or seventeen. The 
secondary school takes account of the pupil's prepara- 
tion as far back as the age of six. In the matter of grad- 
ing and arranging material for historical instruction the 
two kinds of schools have, therefore, essentially the same 
problem. The arrangement first adopted was chronolog- 
ical, the treatment of events in the order of their occur- 
rence. But this, it was objected, is not to grade Jiistory 
at all, and has the further disadvantage of deferring to 
the very end of the course the history which lies nearest 
to the pupil and is most important to him. Some pro- 
posed, therefore, to reverse the chronological arrangement, 
to begin with the present and to study history backward. 
This plan was advocated by d'Alembert and Basedow in 
the eighteenth century. It seemed to have the approval 
of the present German Emperor when, in 1890, he said: 
"Hitherto the road has led from Thermopylae by way of 
Cannae to Rossbach and Bienville. I would lead our 
youths from Sedan and Gravelotte by way of Leuthen 
and Rossbach back to Man tinea and Thermopylae." l 
Others proposed the "high point" plan. They would 
1 Reim, Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts, 77. 



102 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

begin with some great person or some great event easily 
within the intelligence of the pupil and then by a course 
of questioning lead him either backward or forward to 
other great persons, or other great events, equally suited 
to his intelligence. Haupt in 1841, applying principles 
laid down by Pestalozzi, proposed a grouping arrange- 
ment. He would have the first year of school history 
devoted to home life, illustrated by scenes from the home 
life of Romulus, Cyrus, Alexander, Henry IV, Frederick 
II, and so on, the second year to social life, illustrated 
by reference to the social conduct of well-known charac- 
ters, the third year to political life, illustrated by refer- 
ence to great rulers, the fourth year to religious life, the 
fifth year to the arts and sciences, and the sixth year to 
a general chronological survey of history. Biedermann 
in i860 proposed a retrospective arrangement. His 
plan for German Kulturgeschichte was to make clear the 
conditions of life at selected intervals, to pass, for ex- 
ample, from conditions in the fifth century to condi- 
tions in the eighth century, compare them, note the 
changes, and then move backward from the eighth 
century to the fifth to discover the causes that produced 
the changes. The Herbart-Ziller-Rein school of peda- 
gogy applied the culture-epoch theory. 

All of these influenced to some extent the construction 
of programs. But the plan most widely adopted was the 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE IO3 

"concentric circles," or "spiral" plan. The general 
principle of this arrangement is that there should be 
well-defined stages of historical instruction corresponding 
to stages of the pupil's development, and that in each 
stage there should be a survey of the field as a whole. In 
the most elementary survey the design is to leave vivid 
impressions of individual persons and events, either real 
or imaginary, with little or no attempt to make a con- 
nected story. In subsequent surveys facts already pre- 
sented are again brought out, but new facts are added 
and there is increasing emphasis upon the relation of 
facts to each other. In this way the pupil may pass over 
the ground laid out for school history, or, to keep the fig- 
ure of the circle, may look about him from a rising center 
as many times as may be desirable. 

In France history had, as we have seen, a place in the 
program of 1802 for secondary schools. It was, indeed, 
by the law of that year included in the very definition of 
a secondary school. Since then its fortunes have fluc- 
tuated somewhat violently with the ups and downs of 
French politics. It has been sometimes neglected in 
actual instruction and sometimes barely tolerated, some- 
times practically banished and sometimes taught with 
enthusiasm. But it has always appeared in the program 
prescribed by the state for local colleges and for state 
lycees, the two general types of French secondary schools. 



104 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

The program of 1802 had history in three years of the 
six-year course : epitomes of Bible history and of Greek 
history in the first semester of the first year, ancient 
history in the second semester of the second year, and the 
history and geography of France throughout the third 
year. By 182 1 the number of classes had been increased 
by establishing two years of preparatory work and by 
offering at the end of the sixth year, for those who were 
not candidates for degrees, the option of passing to special 
classes in philosophy, mathematics, and physics. For 
boys who elected the latter there were special lessons 
in modern history. The regular program provided his- 
tory in seven of the eight years of the course : Bible his- 
tory in the two preparatory years ; comparison of ancient 
and modern geography in the third year; ancient his- 
tory in the fourth and fifth years ; the Middle Ages in 
the sixth year; and modern history, especially the 
history of France, in the seventh year. The program of 
1842 had history throughout the eight years of the regu- 
lar course. Retaining, for the first seven years, the 
arrangement of 1821, it added in the eighth year a sur- 
vey of French history up to 1789. There was another 
significant addition. Provision was made in each year 
for studying in connection with history the " geography of 
this part of history." In 1852 the concentric circles 
arrangement was adopted. After two preparatory years 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 105 

of Bible history, ancient history and geography were 
treated in the third year as an introduction to French 
history. French history was begun in the fourth year 
and completed in the fifth year. Geography was treated 
as in the program of 1842. Then followed a chronologi- 
cal survey of history and historical geography from an- 
cient to modern times, completed in the eighth year. 
In 1865 special mention of historical geography was dis- 
continued and the concentric circles arrangement was 
abandoned. There were now three preparatory classes. 
The first two had Bible history as before. The third had 
a summary of French history. This was followed by 
a chronological survey of ancient history, begun in the 
fourth year and completed in the sixth year. Then 
came a chronological survey of French history to 18 15, 
completed in the ninth year. The class in philosophy 
had contemporary history, 1 789-1864. In 1876 Euro- 
pean history was substituted for French history in the 
seventh, eighth, and ninth years, and contemporary 
history for the class in philosophy was changed to the 
period 1789-1848. In 1887 Bible history disappeared. 
The first year was now devoted to biographical stories 
of famous men, ancient and modern. The • next two 
years were given to a chronological survey of French 
history. Contemporary history for the class in philos- 
ophy was brought down to 1875. In other respects the 



106 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

program remained as in 1876. In 1890 contemporary 
history for the class in philosophy was extended to 1889. 1 

In this rapid sketch of programs from 1802 to 1890 
only the most important acts of revision have been cited. 
A fuller account would show the history course in al- 
most continuous process of reconstruction. The chief 
difficulty appears to have been the management of 
modern history, especially modern French history. The 
history that men had been living had, after 1789, shifted 
so often its channel and had left behind so much material 
for controversy that each new regime seemed to re- 
quire a new kind of history. The Restoration enjoined 
caution. Teachers were instructed to avoid whatever 
might stir political feeling and engender party animosity. 
In 1842 the special course in French history ended 
abruptly at 1789; in 1852, at 1815. In 1865 contempo- 
rary history was carried for the first time to the pupil's 
own day. In 1876 the limit was fixed at 1848 ; in 1887, 
at 1875 ; in 1890, at 1889. 

In the time schedule history was often listed with 

geography, for classes in which geography was taught, 

but the two were treated as independent subjects with 

little attempt at correlation beyond the emphasis placed 

x The material here used for programs before 1890 is taken from 
Statistique de V Enseignement Secondaire en 1887, appendix. A somewhat 
different view of programs is presented by Greard in Education et In- 
struction, Enseignement Secondaire, II, 274-319. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 107 

upon historical geography. The time allowance varied 
with class and program. At one time history and 
geography together had one hour a week throughout 
the course; at another time they had four hours a 
week. The average was about two hours a week in 
the lower classes and about three hours a week in the 
upper classes. This meant for history and geography 
together an average of about one tenth of the total of 
instruction hours. 

The program at present in force for boys was adopted 
in 1902, and is as follows : 

Year. Class 1 

1. Classes enfantines. Anecdotes and biographical stories, his- 

torical and legendary. Stories of travel. Explanation of 
pictures. 

Preparatory Division 

History one hour a week 

2. Premiere annee. Stories and familiar conversations con- 

cerning the great characters and chief facts of national 
history. 

3. Deuxieme annee. The program of premiere continued. 

Elementary Division 
History and geography three hours a week 

4. Huitieme. Summary of French history to 16 10. 

5. Septieme. Summary of French history, 1610-1871. 

1 As designated in the program. 



108 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

First Cycle 
History and geography three hours a week 

6. Sixieme. Ancient history to Theodosius. 

7. Cinquieme. Middle Ages to the end of the fifteenth century. 

8. Quatrieme. Modern history to 1787. 

9. Troisieme. Modern history continued to 1889. The gov- 

ernment of France in the nineteenth century. 

Second Cycle 

10. Seconde. Review of Europe, tenth to fifteenth centuries. 

Modern history to end of seventeenth century. Two hours 
a week. All sections. 
Ancient history : the Orient and Greece. Two hours a week. 
Sections A and B. 1 

11. Premiere. Modern history, Louis XV to 181 5. Two hours 

a week. All sections. 
Ancient history : Roman and European history to the tenth 
century. Two hours a week. Sections A and B. 

12. Philosophie et Mathematiques. 2 Modern history since 1815. 

Two hours a week, first semester; three hours a week, 
second semester. All sections. 3 

As pupils begin the course here outlined at about the 
age of six, the twelve years correspond to the twelve 

1 Different sections pursue different courses of study. In the first 
cycle pupils have an option between two sections, A and B. The first 
makes Latin obligatory and Greek optional. The second has neither 
Greek nor Latin. In the second cycle there are four sections : 04) Latin 
with Greek ; (B) Latin and modern languages ; (C) Latin and the sciences; 
(D) Modern languages and the sciences, without Latin. 

2 The pupil enters either classe de philosophie or classe de mathi- 
matiques. Each class comprises two sections. 

s Plan d 'Etudes et Programmes d' Enseignement dans les Lycees et Col- 
leges de Garcons. 






HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 109 

years spent by American pupils who follow the usual 
eight-year course of the elementary school and then pass 
through the usual four-year course of the high school. 

Lycees and colleges for girls were authorized for the 
first time by a decree of 1881. The instruction, as or- 
ganized in 1882, admitted pupils at the age of twelve 
and was divided into two periods, one of three years, and 
one of two years. The history for the first period was a 
chronological survey of French history, with some refer- 
ence to general history, down to 1875. The history for 
the second period was a general survey of civilization from 
prehistoric times down to the pupil's own day. The 
program for preparatory classes was left to the discre- 
tion of the individual lycee or college, subject to ap- 
proval by the rector of the academy. 1 The program at 
present in force retains the plan of " facts" for the first 
period and "civilization" for the second period, and in- 
cludes a model for guidance in constructing programs for 
preparatory classes. The latter, designed for girls be- 
tween the ages of eight and twelve, provides in the first 
three years one hour a week of biographical stories, 
chiefly from French history, and in the fourth year one 
hour a week in ancient history. In the upper classes 
history has two hours a week. French history, with a 
summary of general history, is carried to 1 610 in the first 
1 Academies are administrative districts. 



IIO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

year of the first period, continued to about 1787 in the 
second year, and to contemporary France in the third 
year. In the first year of the second period the history 
of civilization is carried from its origins in prehistoric 
times to 1787, and in the second year to the present. 1 

In the German states the particularism already noted 
led, after 18 16, to such variety of detail in history pro- 
grams that general descriptions are likely to be mislead- 
ing. That history should be taught in secondary schools 
was accepted as a matter of course. But different states 
had different programs and even within the same state 
there were marked variations. Moreover, revisions were 
as frequent as in France. The position of Prussia since 
1 87 1 has given a certain prestige to Prussian practice, 
but secondary schools in other parts of the empire have 
continued to shape their history programs with special 
reference to local conditions. In the following examples 
of Gymnasium programs the years in the course are, for 
convenience, designated by numbers and not by the 
German names for the different classes. A six-year 
course commonly implies that pupils enter at the age of 
twelve, a nine-year course, that they enter at the age of 
nine. 

Minden, 1824. Six-year course. 1. Biographical sur- 

1 Plan d' Etudes et Programmes de V ' Enseignement Secondaire des Jewries 
Filles. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE III 

vey of ancient history. 2. Biographical survey of mediae- 
val and modern history. 3. Review of general history, 
followed by Greek history, with the geography of ancient 
Greece. 4. Review of general history, followed by Ger- 
man history. 5 and 6. General history, review of an- 
cient history. 1 

Schleusingen, 1841. Five-year course. 1. Biographi- 
cal survey to the discovery of America. 2. General 
history to the discovery of America. 3. German history 
to 1700. 4. Ancient history to Augustus. 5. General 
history from the discovery of America to the French 
Revolution, followed by mediaeval history. 2 

Muhlhausen, 1841. Five-year course. 1. Biographi- 
cal survey of general history to the Reformation. 

2. Chief events of ancient, mediaeval and modern history. 

3. General history from the beginning of historical knowl- 
edge to Charlemagne. 4. Ancient history and geography 
to end of Greek independence. 5. General history from 
the beginning of historical knowledge to Charlemagne. 3 

Minister, 1842. Six-year course. 1. Ancient history 
to Alexander. 2. Roman history to 476 a.d., with the 
geography of the Roman Empire. 3. German history 
to Peace of Westphalia. 4. Ancient history. 5. An- 

1 Jahresbericht iiber das Gymnasium zu Minden, 1824-1825. 

2 Jahresbericht des gemeinschaftlichen hennebergischen Gymnasiums zu 
Schleusingen, 1841. 

3 Jahresbericht iiber das Gymnasium zu Muhlhausen, 1841. 



112 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

cient history, followed by a review of German history to 
1273. 6. Mediaeval and a part of modern history. 1 

Minister, 1851. Nine-year course. 1. Ancient his- 
tory to the Romans. 2. The Middle Ages. 3. The 
Greeks to the death of Alexander. 4. The Romans to 
Augustus. 5. German history to Ferdinand I. 6. An- 
cient history to Alexander. 7. Greek and Roman his- 
tory. 8. Roman history, followed by the Middle Ages 
to the end of the Crusades. 9. General history from the 
Crusades to the Peace of Westphalia; Brandenburg- 
Prussia to death of Frederick the Great. 2 

Minister, 1856. Nine-year course. 1. No history 
2. No history. 3. The Greeks to the death of Alexan- 
der. 4. The Romans to Augustus. 5. The Germans in 
the Middle Ages to death of Maximilian. 6. Ancient 
history to Alexander. 7. Greek history after Alexander ; 
Roman history to Augustus. 8. Roman history from 
Augustus to 476 a.d. ; the Middle Ages, with special 
reference to German history. 9. Modern history to the 
French Revolution; Brandenburg-Prussia to 181 5. 3 

Nordhausen, 1842. Six-year course. 1. Greek his- 
tory to beginning of Persian wars. 2. Geography and 
history of Germany, especially Prussia. 3. Geography 
and history of Europe. 4. Ancient history and geog- 

1 Jahresbericht iiber das Konigliche Gymnasium zu Miinster, 1 842-1 843. 

2 /^J.,1851-1852. s 76^., 1856-185 7. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 113 

raphy to downfall of Persian Empire. 5. Geography and 
history of Italy to fall of Roman Republic. 6. Modern 
history after 1660. 1 

Nordhausen, 1848. Six-year course. 1. Biographical 
stories from ancient history. 2. History and geography 
of Germany and Prussia. 3. History and geography of 
Europe outside of Germany. 4. Ancient history to the 
battle of Ipsus. 5. Roman history, 390 B.C. to downfall of 
Republic. 6. General history ; the Middle Ages to 1273. 2 

Up to about i860 the Gymnasium was practically the 
only type of German secondary school. Its ideals were 
classical. Latin and Greek alone consumed almost half 
of the total hours of instruction. After i860 other types 
of secondary schools developed rapidly — Realgymnasien, 
Oberrealschulen, Realschulen, and hohere Biirgerschulen. 
The Realgymnasium omitted Greek and laid stress on 
modern languages, mathematics, and natural science. 
The others omitted both Greek and Latin. The history 
program has varied somewhat with the type of school. 
The Realschule at Nordhausen, for example, with a 
seven-year course, had in 1856 the following history 
program: 1. Preparatory class. No history. 2. No 
history. 3. Biographies from ancient history. 4. Ger- 
man history. 5. The German people, most important 

1 Zu der ojjentlichen Priifimg sammtlicher Klassen des Gymnasiums zu 
Nordhausen, 1842-1843. a Ibid., 1848-1849. 

I 



114 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

achievements. 6. The Greeks. 7. Mediaeval and mod- 
ern history to the beginning of the Thirty Years' War. 1 
The same Realschule in 1878, with a six-year course, 
had: 1. No history. 2. No history. 3. Greek and 
Roman history. 4. German history to the end of the 
Middle Ages. 5. The Greeks and their oriental neigh- 
bors. 6. The Middle Ages. 2 

History and geography were sometimes listed together 
throughout the course, sometimes listed together for a 
part of the course and separated for the remainder of 
the course, sometimes listed separately throughout the 
course. There was occasionally systematic correlation 
for a part of the course, but in the main each subject 
was treated independently. The time allowance for 
history was more generous in the secondary schools of 
Germany than in those of France. It was rare in Ger- 
many to find less than two hours a week given to history 
in any class, and the allowance for upper classes was 
sometimes four hours a week. 

The following are examples of current German pro- 
grams : 

Prussia. Gymnasien and Realgymnasien. 1. Scenes 
from the history of the Fatherland. One hour a week. 
2. Stories from ancient history and mythology. The 

1 Zu der ojjentlichen Priifung sammtlicher Klassen der Realschule zu 
Nordhausen, 1856-1857. 2 Ibid., 1878-1879. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 1 1 5 

Greeks to Solon, the Romans to the war with Pyrrhus. 
One hour a week. 3. Greek history to the death of 
Alexander ; Roman history to the death of Augustus. 
Two hours a week. 4. The Roman Empire under the 
great emperors. German history from the first con- 
flict between Romans and Germans to the end of the 
Middle Ages. Review of ancient history. Two hours a 
week. 5. German history from the end of the Middle 
Ages to the accession of Frederick the Great, especially 
Brandenburg-Prussian history. Two hours a week. 

6. German and Prussian history from the accession of 
Frederick the Great to the present. Two hours a week. 

7. Greek history to the death of Alexander; Roman 
history to Augustus. Review of German history. 
Three hours a week. 8. The most important Roman 
emperors. German history to the end of the Thirty 
Years' War. Review of ancient history. Three hours a 
week. 9. Modern history, 1648 to the present, especially 
Brandenburg-Prussian history. Three hours a week. 1 

Saxony. Gymnasien. 1 . Greek mythology ; scenes 
from Greek and Roman history. Two hours a week. 

2. Scenes from later Roman history and from German 
history to the death of Charlemagne. Two hours a week. 

3. Stories from German history from the death of Charle- 

1 Lehr plane und Lchraufgaben fur die hoheren Schulen in Preussen, 
191 1, p. 46-48. 



Il6 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

magne to the Thirty Years' War, with special reference to 
Saxony. Two hours a week. 4. German history from 
1648 to the present, with special reference to Saxony. 
Two hours a week. 5. Oriental and Greek history. Two 
hours a week. 6. Roman history. Two hours a week. 
7. The Middle Ages. Three hours a week. 8. Modern 
history, 1 500-1 740. Three hours a week. 9. Modern 
history, 1740 to the present. Three hours a week. 

Saxony. Realgymnasien. 1. Scenes from Greek his- 
tory and mythology. One hour a week. 2. Scenes 
from Roman and German history to the death of Charle- 
magne. One hour a week. 3. Scenes from German 
history from Charlemagne to the Reformation. Two 
hours a week. 4. German history from the Reforma- 
tion to the present. Two hours a week. 5. Oriental 
and Greek history to the death of Alexander. Two 
hours a week. 6. Roman history to Diocletian. Two 
hours a week. 7. Roman history after Diocletian ; the 
Middle Ages. Two hours a week. 8. Modern history 
to the French Revolution. Two hours a week. 9. Mod- 
ern history, 1789 to the present, especially German his- 
tory. Three hours a week. 1 

In Germany, as in France, state-supported secondary 
schools for girls were a late development of the nine- 
teenth century. The course, including three years of 
1 Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 2, Heft 2, p. 100-101. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 1 17 

preparatory work, usually extends over a period of ten 
years. The following are examples of the most recent 
types of programs : 

Prussia. 1-3. Some history stories in connection with 
instruction in German. 4. Stories from classical an- 
tiquity. Scenes from Brandenburg-Prussian history. 
5. Scenes from general history, especially German history 
and local history. Two hours a week. 6. Chief events 
of Greek history to the death of Alexander and Roman 
history to the death of Augustus ; the great Roman 
emperors ; the triumph of Christianity. Two hours a 
week. 7. German history to the end of the Middle 
Ages. Two hours a week. 8. The Reformation and 
Counter-Reformation. The Thirty Years' War. Age 
of Louis XIV. Brandenburg-Prussian history to the 
death of Frederick the Great. Review of ancient history. 
Two hours a week. 9. Modern history, French Revolu- 
tion to the present. Two hours a week. 10. Selected 
topics in general history. Readings from sources and 
from standard histories. 1 

Saxony. 5. Scenes from German and Saxon history 
to the beginning of the Thirty Years' War. Two hours 
a week. 6. Scenes from German and Saxon history from 
the Thirty Years' War to the present. Two hours a 
week. 7. Ancient history to the Germanic migrations. 
1 Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 2, Heft 1, p. 36-37. 



Il8 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Two hours a week. 8. German history continued to 
1555. Two hours a week. 9. German history, 1555- 
1815, with special reference to Saxony and Prussia. Two 
hours a week. 10. German and Saxon history to the 
present, with special attention to industrial and social 
development. Two hours a week. 1 

In Austria, after the reorganization of secondary 
schools by the law of 1805, history received about the 
same amount of time as in the states of Germany. The 
program of 1849 proved so satisfactory that it became 
the model for the Prussian program of 1859. This 
program had geography, but no history, in the first year. 
Beginning with the second year, history and geography 
were listed together with a time allowance of three hours 
per week. The arrangement was : 2 . Ancient history 
to 476 a.d., with the geography of the countries treated. 
3. The Middle Ages. 4. Modern history, with special 
attention to Austria. 5. Ancient history to the Con- 
quest of Greece by the Romans, including Greek litera- 
ture and mythology and the ancient geography of Asia, 
Africa, and Greece. 6. Roman history, including Roman 
literature and mythology and the geography of the 
Roman Empire, followed by the Middle Ages to the Cru- 
sades. 7. From the Crusades to the War of the Spanish 
Succession. 8. From the War of the Spanish Succession 

1 Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1912, Heft 1, p. 36-37. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 119 

to 18 1 5, with special reference to Austria, and with at- 
tention to the geography of all the countries considered. 1 
In 1884 the time allowance for history was nearly doubled 
and some changes were introduced, chiefly in the upper 
classes. General modern history was completed in the 
seventh year. The eighth year was devoted to the his- 
tory of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy and to a review 
of Greek and Roman history. 2 In the current program, 
adopted in 1909, the field for the third year extends to 
1648. In the eighth year the review of ancient history 
is retained for one semester, but Austro-Hungarian his- 
tory no longer appears. In other respects the program 
remains as in 1884. The same ground is covered in the 
Realgymnasien and in the Realschulen, but the ar- 
rangement differs slightly and there is no review of an- 
cient history at the end. 3 

Most of the other countries of continental Europe have 
formulated programs in history for secondary schools 
as systematic as those of Austria, Germany, and France. 
The plans vary widely, but there is general agreement that 
general history should be taught with special reference to 
national history. The following are examples of programs : 

1 Programm des K. K. Neiistadter Gymnasiums zn Prag, 1853. 

2 Joseph Baar, Studien iiber den geschichtliclien Unterricht an den 
hbheren Lehranstalten des Auslandes. Beilage zum Programm des Pro- 
gymnasiums in Malmedy, 1895, appendix. 

3 Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 2, Heft 2, p. 98. 



120 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Sweden. Ten-year course. Two hours a week, first 
year ; four hours a week, sixth year ; three hours a week 
in each of the other years., i. Northern history and 
mythology; Sweden to 1319. 2. Sweden, 1319-1611 ; 
stories from Greek and Roman history. 3. Sweden, 
1611-1718; ancient history. 4. Sweden, 1718-1809; 
general history to 1648. 5. Sweden, 1809 to the present ; 
general history, 1648 to the present. 6. Review of 
Sweden since 1809 ; the government of Sweden ; review 
of general history since 1815. 7. Ancient and mediaeval 
civilization, Sweden and Europe. 8. General history, 
1500-1715; Sweden, 1520-1718. 9. Sweden, 1718- 
1844; general history, 1715-1848. 10. Sweden since 
1809 ; general history, 181 5 to the present. 1 

Belgium, Athenees Royaux, since 1889. Seven-year 
course. Two hours a week throughout the course. 
1. Survey of general history. 2. Ancient history; the 
Middle Ages to the Crusades. 3. Review of "2"; 
general history from the Crusades to 1789. 4. Brief 
survey of contemporary history ; history of Belgium. 5. 
Ancient history ; the Middle Ages to the Crusades. 6. 
Review of "5"; general history from the Crusades to 
1789. 7. History of Belgium; modern history since 



1 Redo gor else for Lunds Hbgre Allmanna Laroverk, 1911-1912. 

2 Minister e de I'Interieur et de V Instruction publique, 1905, p. 22-26. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 121 

Russia, program of 1890. Eight-year course. 1 and 
2. No history. 3. Russian history. 4. Ancient his- 
tory. 5. The Middle Ages ; Russian history to Ivan IV. 
6. Modern history ; Russian history to the death of 
Peter I. 7. Modern history, 1715 to the present; Rus- 
sian history. 8. Greek and Roman history ; Russian 
history. The time allowance for history in the fifth 
year is three hours a week and in the other years two 
hours a week. 1 

Italy, program of 1894. Eight-year course. 1-3. No 
history. 4. Oriental and Greek history. 5. Italian 
history to 476 a.d. 6. European history, 476 to Henry 
VII of Luxembourg, with special reference to Italian 
history. 7. European and Italian history, Henry VII 
to 1748. 8. European and Italian history, 1748 to the 
present. The time allowance for history is four hours a 
week in the last two years and three hours a week in 
each of the other years. 2 

Spain, program of 1895. Five-year course. Two 
years of history. 2. History of Spain. Three hours a 
week. 3. General history. Three hours a week. 3 

In England the systematic teaching of history in 
secondary schools was inaugurated by Thomas Arnold 
at Rugby about 1830. His plan was to begin in the 

1 Joseph Baar, op. cit., Part I, appendix. 

2 Ibid. Ubid., Part II, 15. 



122 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

lowest classes with scenes from universal history. These 
were followed in the middle classes by lively histories 
of Greece, Rome, and England, and in the higher classes 
by the study of some historian of the first rank, "whose 
mind was formed in, and bears the stamp of, some period 
of advanced civilization analogous to that in which we 
now live " ; for example, Thucydides or Tacitus. 1 After 
Arnold little was done with history until the universities 
of Oxford and Cambridge in the seventies began to recog- 
nize history in their examinations. History then be- 
came practically universal in secondary schools. Ex- 
aminations, however, encouraged subjects rather than 
well-organized courses in history. The fields usually 
covered were Greek and Roman history, and English 
history to 1815 or to 1832. Often also Bible history was 
included, and occasionally modern continental Europe 
received some attention. During the last twenty years 
some schools have introduced more connected courses, 
but in general the subject system still prevails. 

Elementary education lagged behind secondary edu- 
cation, and history programs for elementary schools 
developed in consequence less rapidly than those for 
secondary schools. Where elementary schools existed, 
history, as a rule, received some attention, but it was 
not until about 1850 that it began to be generally 

1 Withers, Teaching of History, 113. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 1 23 

recognized as a separate branch of instruction, and it 
was not until about 1870 that it began to be generally 
prescribed for all elementary schools. Even then Eng- 
land formed a notable exception. Here history remained 
to the very close of the century an option, to be included 
in elementary instruction, or omitted, at the discretion 
of the masters. 

Programs for the elementary schools down to the 
present have in most cases confined the material to 
national history. Surveys of general history beyond 
what is strictly essential to an understanding of national 
history are sometimes included, but usually amount to 
little more than a bare outline. The arrangement of 
materials has varied as widely as the arrangement of 
materials for the secondary school. The plan most 
generally favored appears to have been the concentric 
circles plan, but the culture-epoch theory has also exerted 
a very considerable influence. Both now seem to be 
declining in favor. At the present time history is taught 
in elementary schools throughout Europe, sometimes in 
every year of the course, more often in the last four or 
five years only. Programs for girls occasionally differ 
from those for boys in their greater emphasis upon 
Kulturgeschichte. Where history is taught in the lowest 
classes it usually receives one hour a week. In the 
upper classes the allowance is usually two hours, but 



124 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

may, for girls, be reduced to one hour in the last year or 
two years. In the following examples of current pro- 
grams the numbers indicate the age of pupils and not 
the year in the course. 

France. 5-7. Anecdotes and biographical stories 
from French history ; stories of travel ; explanation of 
pictures. 7-9. Stories of great characters and chief 
events of French history to end of Hundred Years' War. 
9-1 1. Summary of French history from end of fifteenth 
century to the present, n-13. Review of French 
history, with a more thorough study of the modern 
period; very brief summary of general history. 1 

Berlin. 8. The Emperor and his family, his parents 
and grandparents. 9. Biographical stories from Augus- 
tus to Rudolph of Hapsburg. 10. German history, 
especially Kulturgeschichte, from Maximilian to end of 
Thirty Years' War. 11. Brandenburg-Prussian history 
to the death of Frederick the Great ; Louis XIV ; Peter 
the Great; Charles XII. 12. Prussian history to the 
present; the government of Prussia and of Berlin; 
the American Revolution ; the French Revolution ; the 
Napoleonic Empire ; Napoleon III ; the unification of 
Italy. 13. German and Prussian territorial expansion; 
German and Prussian constitutional history. 2 

1 Plan d' 'Etudes des Ecoles Primaires Elementaires. 
8 Reim, Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts, 82-84. 



HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 125 

Munich. 10. The foundation of German Christian 
culture : German and Bavarian history to the death of 
Frederick Barbarossa. n. The development of Ger- 
manism : German and Bavarian history to Frederick 
the Great. 12. The rebirth of the German Empire: 
German and Bavarian history from Frederick the Great 
to the present. 13. The new German Empire; the 
history of Munich ; position of Bavaria in the Empire ; 
industrial and constitutional development of Bavaria 
and of the Empire. 1 

London. 7-8. Simple stories and events mainly con- 
nected with a few outstanding characters. 9. Stories of 
ancient life and civilization. 10-n. British history from 
the earliest times to 1688. 12. British history from 1688 
to the present day. 13. A more definite understanding 
of modern British history, combined with Imperial his- 
tory from the beginning of the age of discovery. 2 

The nineteenth century has been called the century 
of history. It was then that historians began really to 
see the past clearly through the eyes of the past and to 
recognize in a new and fuller sense the differences be- 
tween existence in the past and existence in the present. 
The idea of development changed the whole aspect of 

1 Vergangenheit und Gegcnwart, 1913, Heft 1, p. 25-27. 

2 Recommendations in Report of a Conference on the Teaching of His- 
tory in London Elmentary Schools, 1911, p. 51. 



126 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

historical study and made the historical point of view 
essential in every department of learning. But school 
programs in history responded slowly to these profound 
changes. The nineteenth century inherited and pre- 
served the tradition that history should cultivate the 
moral and spiritual nature of the pupil. To this was 
added the patriotic motive. Until late in the century 
the idea that history should cultivate a historical atti- 
tude of mind, that only through the past can the present 
be made intelligible, and other implications of scientific 
history received scarcely more than casual mention. 
After i860 Kulturgeschichte became a general issue, and 
after 1870 a generally recognized feature of school his- 
tory. The use of primary sources was vigorously ad- 
vocated, but still more vigorously opposed. After 1890 
the demand that school history should be historical, 
that it should trace development, that it should, above 
all, explain the present, and that the chief emphasis 
should in consequence be laid upon later modern his- 
tory, became rather general in educational discussions. 
But it was not until the formulation of the French pro- 
gram of 1902 that such considerations became really 
paramount in practice, and the French program re- 
mains the most advanced example of its kind. 1 

1 For further references to the content of school history see Chapters 
VI and VII. 



CHAPTER V 

History in the School Curriculum in the United 
States 

In the United States the recognition of history as 
an independent branch of school instruction began to 
assume perceptible proportions about 1815. Before 
that time history, when taught at all, appears to have 
been taught incidentally in connection with other 
subjects. Early in the eighteenth century separate 
textbooks for history began to be imported and by the 
middle of the century to be produced, but their circu- 
lation seems to have been very limited. No textbook 
treatment of American history was attempted until 
about 1785, when Noah Webster included "short stories 
of the geography and history of the United States" 
in his Grammatical Institutes of the English Language, 
a combination of reading book, spelling book, and gram- 
mar. In 1788 the same author wrote for Morse's Geog- 
raphy "an account of the transactions of the United 
States after the Revolution ; which account fills nearly 
twenty pages." l Just at the close of the century his- 
1 Quoted by Russell, in History Teacher's Magazine, V, 311. 
127 



128 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

tory seems occasionally to have received some special 
attention. Lewis Cass, who left the academy at Exeter 
in 1799, carried with him a certificate that named his- 
tory as one of the studies in which he had made "valuable 
progress." * In the early years of the nineteenth cen- 
tury there may have been other schools in which pupils 
made "valuable progress" in history, but the school 
curricula of the time bear scarcely any testimony to 
suggest the opportunity for winning such distinction. 

The earliest indications of a "movement" toward the 
establishment of history as a separate school study may 
be dated about 181 5. It was at first a slow movement. 
History, in the course of ten years, was added to the 
curriculum in perhaps a score of academies in New 
England and New York. In 1827, Massachusetts, 
by statutory mandate, placed "the history of the United 
States" on the list of subjects to be taught in "every 
city, town, or district of five hundred families or house- 
holders," and "history" on the list of subjects to be 
taught, "in addition to all the aforegoing branches," 
in "every city, town, or district containing four thousand 
inhabitants." The law was never rigidly enforced, but 
ten years later more schools had provided for both the 
"history of the United States" and for "history" than 
for any other subject added by the law to the older 

1 McLaughlin, Lewis Cass, 39. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 1 29 

strictly common branches. More than two thirds of 
the towns reporting in 1837 offered United States 
History. 1 Within the same period history advanced 
rapidly in the academies of New York. In 1834 all 
but one of those reporting to the Regents of the Uni- 
versity of New York had admitted history. Later, as 
the number of schools increased, the proportion of those 
teaching history for a time fell off somewhat. In Mas- 
sachusetts also, there was, for some years after 1837, a 
relative decline. But in both sections the academies 
and high schools that offered history continued to con- 
stitute a majority. In 1852, 126 out of 170 in New York 
offered general history and 91 United States history; 
in 1862, 132 out of 204 academies offered general history 
and 169 United States history. 2 

Outside of Massachusetts and New York the response 
to the claims of history appears to have come less 
readily. Among the newer states Michigan manifested, 
perhaps, the keenest and most sustained interest. 
Here in 1837, at the very beginning of statehood, the 
Superintendent of Public Instruction included in his 
Report a plea for the teaching of United States history 
in the common schools. 3 In 1847 the University of 

1 Russell, in History Teacher's Magazine, V, 312-315. 

2 See Reports, Regents of University of New York, for years indicated. 

3 Report, Superintendent of Public Instruction, 1837, p. 16. 



130 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Michigan shared with Harvard the honor of introducing 
history as an entrance requirement. In 1870 Michigan 
stood alone in adding to the list of entrance requirements 
American History. 

A few years after history began to be admitted to 
secondary schools it began also to be admitted to ele- 
mentary schools. Its progress was in some cases 
more rapid in elementary than in secondary school 
curricula. In 1826, in the state of New York, "the 
history of the United States was studied in six towns 
only." In 1834, it constituted "a part of the course 
of instruction in one hundred and four towns." x In 
1844, it was reported as taught in most of the schools 
of the entire state. 2 Scattering references to the con- 
ditions in other states indicate, in most cases, a some- 
what later but equally decisive advance. - 

During the formative period scarcely any attempt was 
made to draw up a systematic program for history. 
The idea was to teach subjects in history and not, as in 
Germany and France, to organize courses in history. 
The subject for the elementary school was American 
history. "The history of foreign countries," said the 
New York State Superintendent of schools in 1835, 
"however desirable it may be, cannot ordinarily enter 

1 Report, New York Superintendent of Schools, 1833-1835, p. 21. 

2 Ibid., 1844, p. 452. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 131 

into a system of common school education without 
opening too wide a field. It is safer in general to treat 
it as a superfluity, and leave it to such as have leisure 
in after life." l To such the elementary school did for 
many years in fact leave it, partly because the time 
allowed for history was too short for any account of 
foreign countries, and partly because of a belief that 
American history was all sufficient for the purposes of 
American elementary schools. The subject was com- 
monly taught in the upper grades only, often only in the 
last year. 

In academies and high schools the subjects varied 
widely. The work was sometimes confined to general 
history or to ancient history, sometimes to American 
history ; sometimes two or all three of these subjects 
were offered, sometimes English history was substituted 
for one of them, or added as a fourth subject. Other 
subjects often listed separately were Grecian antiquities, 
Roman antiquities, mythology, and, occasionally, eccle- 
siastical history. Foreign countries received, on the 
whole, more attention than the United States. In New 
York, for example, until about i860, general history 
alone was listed more frequently than United States 
history. The arrangement of subjects in the curriculum 
varied as widely as the subjects themselves. 

1 Report, New York Superintendent of Schools, 1833-1835, p. 21. 



132 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

Among the values most frequently claimed for his- 
torical instruction were moral training, training for 
citizenship, and discipline of the memory, the judgment, 
and the imagination. The moral and disciplinary values 
of history were described quite in the manner that had 
already become traditional in Europe. The ideas were 
essentially the same as those advanced by Rollin in the 
eighteenth century. 1 The relation of history to citizen- 
ship in a free country presented a new condition and 
invited new forms of expression. Love of country, 
loyalty to national ideals, reverence for law, and respect 
for constituted authority were enumerated quite in 
the spirit of old-world tradition. But a different chord 
was touched in enlarging on the duties of free citizens. 
Every voter, it was urged, is in effect called upon to be 
a statesman, and statesmen need history in a special 
way both for guidance and for inspiration. Other and 
more general values claimed for history were that it 
"elevates the mind" and "enlarges the soul," opens 
sources of amusement as well as of profound thought, 
and gives a taste for solid reading. It was also asserted, 
but less frequently, that the study of history promotes 
sound religion. 

By 1870 history appears to have won fairly general 
acceptance as one of the essential school studies. Its 
1 See above, p. 89. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 133 

position in the high school began at about this time to 
be materially strengthened by a widening recognition 
of history as a requirement for entrance to college. 
But for about twenty years history continued to develop 
substantially along the lines already indicated. A 
committee of the National Education Association, re- 
porting, in 1876, a course of study from the primary 
school to the university, probably represented the aver- 
age practice of the day in recommending United States 
history as a subject to be required in elementary schools 
and "universal history and the Constitution of the 
United States" as subjects to be required in high schools. 
In the better schools United States history continued 
to find a place in one or both of the upper grades of the 
elementary schools ; ancient history, or a brief course 
in general history, or both, in the high school. Few 
elementary schools began history before the seventh 
grade, and fewer still admitted any European history. 
The consequence for children who left school before 
entering the seventh grade, as was the case with the 
majority, is at once apparent. Instruction in history 
in the high school might be for a term, a half year, or a 
year. In some favored schools it might extend over 
two or more years and include, in addition to the courses 
already indicated, a course in American history, or a 
course in English history, or both. 



134 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

In 1892 the National Education Association created 
the Committee of Ten with instructions to organize con- 
ferences for the discussion of the various subjects that 
entered "into the programs of secondary schools in the 
United States and into the requirements for admission 
to college," and to make such recommendations as might 
seem appropriate. The Conference on History, Civil 
Government, and Political Economy met at Madison in 
December, 1892, and its report placed before the general 
educational public for the first time in America a history 
program approaching in completeness programs for 
more than fifty years familiar in Europe. The Confer- 
ence asked for eight consecutive years of history, four in 
the elementary school, and four in the high school, as 
follows : 

1st and 2d years. Biography and mythology. 

3d year. American history ; and elements of civil government. 

4th year. Greek and Roman history, with their Oriental con- 
nections. 

5th year. (Beginning of high school.) French history. To 
be so taught as to elucidate the general movement 
of mediaeval and modern history. 

6th year. English history. To be so taught as to elucidate 
the general movement of mediaeval and modern 
history. 

7th year. American history. 

8th year. A special period, studied in an intensive manner; 
and civil government. 



IN THE UNITED STATES I35 

For schools unable to adopt this arrangement an 
alternative course of six years was suggested : 

1st and 2d years. Biography and mythology. 

3d year. American history, and civil government. 

4th year. (Beginning of high school.) Greek and Roman his- 
tory, with their Oriental connections. 

5th year. English history. To be so taught as to elucidate 
the general movement of mediaeval and modern 
history. 

6th year. American history and civil government. 

The Conference further resolved that "in no year of 
either course ought the time devoted to these subjects 
to be less than the equivalent of three forty-minute 
periods per week throughout the year." * 

The elementary school, unfortunately, was beyond 
the province of the Committee of Ten. The vital prin- 
ciple of consecutive study could, therefore, not be con- 
sidered in the form proposed. It proved difficult to 
apply even for the high school. The history conference 
was only one of nine conferences. When the conclusions 
of all were tabulated, it appeared that to carry all the 
recommendations into effect would require 22 instruc- 
tion periods per week in the first year of the high school, 
37^ in the second, 35 in the third, and 37! in the fourth. 
The Committee adopted twenty periods per week as a 
desirable maximum and arranged four different courses 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, p. 163. 



136 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

of study. The number of periods per week allotted to 
history in the various courses is shown in the following 
table : 

Year Classical Latin Scientific Modern Languages English 

14 4 44 

23 o 04 

30 2 24 

4 1 3 3 3 3 2 

The report of the Committee of Ten indicated clearly 
the possibility of more history for the high school. It 
indicated also a condition that has puzzled makers of 
programs down to the present day. History for all high 
school pupils in every year of the course was apparently 
beyond hope of attainment. The Committee proposed 
four years for the English course only. In the other 
three courses there were to be two years of required 
history and one year of elective history. Here lay the 
difficulty. What history was best for those who would 
satisfy only the minimum requirement? What history 
was best for those who would elect an additional year? 
Either question alone might have been answered with 
some degree of assurance. The Madison Conference 
had, indeed, already answered the second question: 
1st year, ancient history; 2d year, English history; 

1 Except in the English course, fourth year pupils were offered a choice 
between history and mathematics. 

2 Report, Committee of Ten, p. 46-47. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 137 

3d year, American history and government. But the 
question of what was best for a three years' course could 
not be separated from the question of what was best 
for a two years' course. The arrangement proposed 
by the Conference would leave pupils who failed to 
elect the third year's work strangers in their own coun- 
try. The subjects might of course be shifted : ist year, 
English history ; 2d year, American history ; 3d year, 
ancient history ; or, ist year, ancient history; 2d year, 
American history ; 3d year, English history. But 
ancient history in the third year, apart from any ques- 
tion of orderly sequence, would obviously not be fair to 
the classical course. English history in the third year 
would, for the two years' course, leave an unspanned 
gap between ancient history and American history, and, 
for the three years' course, erect a span after the passage. 
For several years the problem thus presented was left 
to the initiative of individual schools for solution. 
Cooperative efforts were, in the meantime, directed to 
increasing the amount rather than to specifying the kind 
of history. The most likely avenue of approach seemed 
to be that of college entrance requirements. Colleges 
had since 1870 been steadily extending the range of the 
history requirement. In 1895, out of a total of 475 uni- 
versities and colleges investigated by the United States 
Bureau of Education, 306 required American history; 



138 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

127, general history; 112, Greek history; 116, Roman 
history ; 57, English history ; 9, state and local history ; 
and 1, French and German history. 1 These conditions 
were in part the source, and in part the reflection, of a 
larger interest in history in the high schools. They 
had developed in response to local opinion and local 
practice and were now becoming somewhat unmanage- 
able. Most high schools had to consider a variety of 
college requirements and taught in consequence, not a 
carefully arranged course in history, but, as of old, 
merely subjects in history. Most of the colleges had 
to consider a variety of preparation for college work in 
history and prescribed in consequence college courses 
that were themselves preparatory. It would clearly 
be to the advantage both of high schools and of col- 
leges to encourage at least some degree of uniformity. 
The question was considered in 1895 by a committee of 
the New England Association of Colleges and Prepara- 
tory Schools, and in 1896 by a conference, representing 
six leading eastern universities, held at Columbia. 

The New England Committee suggested seven topics, 
any two of which, on the assumption that each had 
been pursued three periods a week for a year, were to 
constitute a subject for entrance. The colleges were 
further "earnestly requested to accept any additional 

1 Report, Commissioner of Education, 1896-1807, p. 468. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 139 

topic or topics from the list as additional preparation 
for entrance or for advanced standing." The topics 



1. The History of Greece, with special reference to Greek life, 

literature, and art. 

2. The History of Rome; the Republic and Empire, and Teu- 

tonic outgrowths to 800 a.d. 

[To be so taught as to elucidate the general 

' , __, I movement of mediaeval and modern 

4. French History 

{ history. 

5. English History, with special reference to social and political 

development. 

6. American History, with the elements of Civil Government. 

7. A detailed study of a limited period pursued in an intensive 

manner. 1 

The New England Association adopted these sugges- 
tions with one important modification. The attempt, in 
the second topic, to bring Roman history into connec- 
tion with general European history, by going beyond the 
traditional "Fall" of 476 a.d., encountered opposition 
from secondary-school men on the ground that so 
extended a period could not be covered in a single year. 
The Association heeded the protest and substituted for 
800 a.d. the accession of Commodus. 2 

The Columbia Conference accepted the general prin- 
ciple which had been laid down by the New England 

1 Publication No. 5, New England History Teachers' Association, 13. 

2 School Review III, 619-631. 



140 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Committee, but changed the topics somewhat and 
arranged them in two groups. In the first group were 
four topics any two of which, on the assumption that 
each had been pursued three periods a week for a year, 
were to be accepted for entrance. The topics were : 

i. The History of Greece to the death of Alexander, with. due 
reference to Greek life, literature, and art. 

2. The History of Rome to the accession of Commodus, with 

due reference to literature and government. 

3. English History, with due reference to social and political 

development. 

4. American History, with the elements of civil government. 

In the second group were four topics any one of which, 
on the assumption that it had been pursued three periods 
a week for two years, was to be accepted either as 
additional preparation for entrance or for advanced 
standing. The topics were : 

1. Greek and Roman History for those who have offered Eng- 

lish History and American History as an elementary 
subject. 

2. English History and American History for those who have 

offered Greek and Roman History as an elementary 
subject. 

3. The History of Europe from the Germanic Invasions to the 

beginning of the seventeenth century. 

4. A year's study of any of the elementary fields not already 

offered as an elementary subject, combined with a year's 
detailed study of a limited period within that field. 1 
1 Publication No. 5, New England History Teachers' Association, 16, 17. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 141 

Within a year Cornell, the University of Pennsyl- 
vania, and Tufts College accepted the recommendations 
of the Columbia Conference. Dartmouth and Mount 
Holyoke soon followed, and Harvard also accepted them 
provisionally. By 1900 a number of other colleges and 
universities had them under consideration. 

The effect upon the high schools, as was foreseen and 
intended, was to increase in a marked degree the amount 
of historical instruction. Objections to the new arrange- 
ment came chiefly from teachers of the classics. In 
their opinion, to increase the offering in history would 
lead inevitably to a decrease in the attention devoted to 
Greek and Roman history. Their influence was to some 
extent felt in the discussions of the New England Asso- 
ciation. It secured from the Columbia Conference the 
definite statement that "it is very desirable that Greek 
and Roman history be offered as a part of the preparation 
of every candidate," and the recommendation that these 
two topics be named wherever a college "finds it neces- 
sary to specify the particular subjects to be required." 1 

In the meantime, the Committee on College Entrance 
Requirements, authorized in 1895 by the National 
Education Association, through its Departments of 
Secondary and of Higher Education, had been seeking 
the cooperation of other organizations in an attempt to 

1 Publication No. 5, New England History Teachers' Association, 16. 



142 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

deal with the entire question. The response of the 
American Historical Association was the appointment 
in December, 1896, of the Committee of Seven. To 
that committee, however, according to the report made 
in 1899, even before the members "began seriously to 
consider what work was to be done, it became apparent 
that only a thorough study would be profitable, that 
general conclusions or recommendations, even on such 
a question as that of college entrance requirements, 
could not be made without an examination of the whole 
field and a consideration of many fundamental princi- 
ples, or without ascertaining what was now doing in 
the high schools and academies of the country." 

"Before this work was undertaken," continues the 
report, "there had not been any systematic attempt of 
this kind ; nor had there been any prolonged effort by 
any national association to present the claims of history 
or to set before the schoolmen a statement of what might 
be considered the value of historical study and the place 
which it should occupy in the school program. We do 
not leave out of consideration the work of the Com- 
mittee of Ten, nor do we underestimate the value or the 
effect of the able and highly interesting report of the 
Madison Conference on History, Civil Government, 
and Economics; and we do not lose sight of the fact 
that historical instruction in the secondary schools had 



IN THE UNITED STATES 143 

often been discussed in pedagogical conferences and 
teachers' associations. Before we began our work, it 
was plain that there was an awakening interest in this 
whole subject, and the time seemed to be at hand when 
a systematic effort would meet with response and pro- 
duce results. But in spite of all that had been done, 
and in spite of this awakened interest, there was no 
recognized consensus of opinion in the country at large, 
not one generally accepted judgment, not even one well- 
known point of agreement, which would serve as a be- 
ginning for a consideration of the place of history in the 
high school curriculum. Such a statement cannot be 
made concerning any other subject commonly taught 
in the secondary schools." * 

The Committee, after a careful consideration of pro- 
grams and conditions both in the United States and in 
Europe, recommended a four years' course in history, 
as follows : 

First year. Ancient History to 800 A.D., or 814, or 843. 
Second year. Mediaeval and Modern European History. 
Third year. English History. 
Fourth year. American History and Civil Government. 

For a three years' course the committee suggested 
either "any three of the above blocks" or such modifi- 
cations as the following: 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 2-3. 



144 TEACHING OF HISTORY 



B 



First or second year. Ancient History to 800 a.d. 

Second or third year. English History, with special reference to 
the chief events in the history of con- 
tinental Europe. 

Third or fourth year. American History and Civil Government. 

C 
First or second year. Ancient History to 800 a.d. 
Second or third year. Mediaeval and Modern European History. 
Third or fourth year. American History, with a consideration 

of the chief events in the history of 

England. 1 

In the adjustment of college entrance requirements 
the Committee laid down two conditions as essential : 

(1) "that the fundamental scope and purpose of the 
major part of the secondary schools be regarded ; " and 

(2) "that such elasticity be allowed that schools may fit 
for college and yet adapt themselves to some extent to 
local environment and local needs." A unit of history 
was defined as " one year of historical work wherein the 
study is given five times a week or two years of historical 
work wherein the study is given three times per week." 
For colleges with complete options in entrance require- 
ments, colleges, that is, which accepted "a given number 
of years' work, or units, without prescribing special 
subjects of study," the Committee recommended four 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 134-135. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 145 

units of history "as an equivalent for a like amount of 
work in other subjects," likewise one, two, or three units ; 
for colleges that definitely prescribed some subjects, 
and required in addition a certain number of other sub- 
jects to be chosen from a list of options, one unit of 
history in the list of prescribed studies, and one, two, or 
three units in the list of optional studies ; for colleges 
with "several distinct courses of study leading to differ- 
ent degrees," and distinct groups of entrance require- 
ments, one unit of history for the classical course, one 
for the Latin, two units for the scientific, and three for 
the English, the offerings in each case to be taken from 
the blocks in the four years' course proposed by the Com- 
mittee. 1 

The National Education Association indorsed these 
recommendations, but with the proviso that one year 
of American history and government should be accepted 
as a requirement for admission by all colleges, and a 
further resolution "that colleges should accept, in addi- 
tion to the one year of United States history and civil 
government already recommended, at least one half 
year of intensive study of some period of history, espe- 
cially of the United States." 2 

The Committee of Seven devoted ten pages to a dis- 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 121, 123. 

2 Proceedings, National Education Association, 1899, p. 648, 665. 

L 



146 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

cussion of the value of historical study. The chief ad- 
vance over earlier ideas was in the emphasis placed 
upon history as an aid "in developing what is sometimes 
called the scientific habit of mind and thought," and 
upon "the training which pupils receive in the handling 
of books." * The other claims were essentially those 
familiar in the middle of the nineteenth century, except 
that nothing was said of historical instruction as a factor 
in religious training. The proportions were, however, 
somewhat different. History as an aid in cultivating the 
judgment received more attention than history as an aid 
in forming character. The treatment of the latter can 
practically be summed up in a sentence. "We may 
venture to suggest," said the Committee, "that character 
is of even greater value than culture." 2 

The blocks recommended by the Committee of 
Seven became, within a few years, the units most gen- 
erally recognized both in high school courses of study 
and in requirements for entrance to college. A con- 
siderable number of schools offered all of the blocks, 
sometimes in the order proposed by the Committee, 
sometimes with English history in the second year and 
mediaeval and modern European history in the third 
year. A still greater number offered three of the blocks, 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 23, 25. 

2 Ibid., 25. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 147 

omitting, as a rule, English history. But the schools 
that offered all the blocks in relatively few instances 
required all for graduation. Some of them required no 
history at all and offered the blocks merely as electives ; 
some of them required one block, some two blocks, some 
three blocks, and offered the remainder as electives. 
The schools that offered three of the blocks in a larger 
proportion of instances required all three, but a con- 
siderable fraction required only two blocks, a smaller 
fraction only one block, and in some cases all three 
blocks were elective. 1 

There was from the first some dissatisfaction with 
the blocks proposed by the Committee. Since ancient 
history was to be followed by mediaeval and modern 
European history the extension of the former to 800 a.d. 
seemed to some unnecessary and unwise. Ancient 
and mediaeval history, in the opinion of others, had a 
disproportionate share of time, and English history 
ought, it was sometimes said, to come before general 
European history. But granting that either the four 
blocks or the three blocks, as presented by the Com- 
mittee, made an acceptable course, the fact remained 
that most pupils must leave the high schools with not 
more than two years of history, and many with only 

1 For a survey of conditions in 1909 see Indiana University Bulletin, 
September, 1909. 



148 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

one year of history. Did any one of the four blocks, or 
any two of them, constitute the best arrangement that 
could be made for so short a course ? The answer of the 
Committee was in the affirmative. For those who might 
take a different view there was merely a somewhat reluc- 
tant suggestion of modes of compressing English and 
American history, or English and European history, 
into a single year. 1 But textbook writers almost uni- 
versally adopted the regular blocks, and most teachers, 
of necessity, followed the textbooks. 

In December, 1907, on the presentation of a formal 
request from the Headmasters' Association for changes 
in the recommendations of the Committee of Seven, the 
American Historical Association authorized the appoint- 
ment of the Committee of Five "to determine what 
modifications, if any, were needed." The result was 
essentially a reargument of the case presented by the 
Committee of Seven, but two of the four blocks were 
changed materially with a view to greater emphasis 
upon modern history. The Committee of Five did not 
advocate "an immediate change in every school, the 
universal abandonment of the plan of the Committee 
of Seven, and the immediate substitution of a new cur- 
riculum." "We content ourselves," said the Committee 
of Five, "first, with advising a change in emphasis when 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 43. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 



149 



the plan of the Committee of Seven does not seem fea- 
sible ; and second, by the proposal of a course which we 
believe to be on the whole better than the old, and which 
we think will suit the needs of schools ready to take up 
seriously the study of modern history." 1 The new 
course was as follows : 

First Year. Ancient history to 800 a.d. or thereabouts, the 
events of the last five hundred years to be 
passed over rapidly. 

Second Year. English history, beginning with a brief statement 
of England's connection with the ancient 
world. The work should trace the main line 
of English development to about 1760, in- 
clude as far as possible or convenient the chief 
facts of general European history, especially 
before the seventeenth century, and give 
something of the colonial history of America. 

Third Year. Modern European history, including such intro- 
ductory matter concerning later mediaeval in- 
stitutions and the beginnings of the modern 
age as seems wise or desirable, and giving a 
suitable treatment of English history from 
1760. 

Fourth Year. American history and government, arranged on 
such a basis that some time may be secured 
for the separate study of government. 2 

The majority of schools apparently still find the plan 
of the Committee of Seven feasible and will no doubt 

1 Report, Committee of Five, p. 2, 55, 56. J Ibid., 64. 



ISO 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 



continue to find it feasible until the colleges introduce 
other units into their list of entrance requirements. 
Reports received in 19 14 from about six hundred schools 
seemed to indicate that about forty of these schools 
were disregarding altogether the block system. Of the 
remainder, 510 offered ancient history; 456, European 
history; 348, English history; and 473, American 
history. The subjects were distributed as follows : 





First Year 


Second 
Year 


THrRD 
Year 


Fourth 
Year 




-a 
.§ 

(2 


> 
3 


■8 
.u 


1 

3 


I 

(2 


> 

•2 
3 


1 
3 


3 


Ancient History . . . 


198 


93 


133 


59 


18 


5 


3 


1 


European History . . 


18 


3 


179 


96 


92 


60 


5 


3 


English History . . . 


31 


11 


39 


22 


103 


118 


11 


13 


American History . . 


II 


3 


11 


2 


52 


19 


30S 


70 



The increase of interest in history after 1892 extended 
also to the elementary school. The Committee of 
Fifteen on elementary education, reporting to the De- 
partment of Superintendence of the National Educa- 
tion Association in 1895, recommended oral lessons 
in general history and biography, sixty minutes a week, 
throughout the eight years of the elementary course. 1 
These lessons were to "proceed from the native land 

1 Report, Committee of Fifteen, 93. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 15 1 

first to England, the parent country, and then to the 
classic civilizations (Greece and Rome being, so to speak, 
the grandparent countries of the American colonies)." 1 

In the seventh year and the first half of the eighth 
there were to be, in addition to the oral lessons on 
general history, five textbook lessons a week on United 
States history up to the adoption of the Constitution, 
and in the second half of the eighth year five lessons a 
week on the Constitution. "The formation of the 
Constitution, and a brief study of the salient features 
of the Constitution itself," says the report, "conclude 
the study of the portion of the history of the United 
States that is sufficiently remote to be treated after the 
manner of an educational classic." The later epochs 
seemed to the Committee "not so well fitted for intensive 
study in school as the already classic period of our his- 
tory," and were left to be read at home ! 2 To this 
proposition, however, not all of the members subscribed. 

The Committee of Twelve on rural schools, appointed 
at the meeting of the National Education Association 
in 1895, proposed a program for history strongly sugges- 
tive of French influence, both in the grouping of classes 
and in the treatment of materials. 3 The plan was as 
follows : 

1 Report, Committee of Fifteen, 70. 

2 Ibid., 66. 

3 For outline of French program see above, p. 124. 



152 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Group I. (Age, 5- 7) Stories from biography, history, and 

travels. Explanation of pictures. 
Group II. (Age, 7- 9) Current Events. Stories of eminent 
characters and memorable events. 
Group III. (Age, 9-1 1) Extension of II. Readings in United 

States history. 
Group IV. (Age, 11-13) Selected epochs of general history, with 
study of leading historical characters. 1 

Interest in the elementary history program, usually 
including civics, was further stimulated and directed 
by individual contributions. Gordy and Twitchell 
applied the concentric circles idea to American history 
and carried it far beyond the limit set in Europe. Euro- 
pean programs of the concentric type had two or three 
surveys of the field. Gordy and Twitchell had seven 
surveys of American history, one in each of the first six 
grades, and one running through the two upper grades. 2 
Miss Lucy M. Salmon, a member of the Committee of 
Seven, in her Study of History Below the Secondary School, 
published as an appendix to the report of the Committee, 
proposed that history should begin in the third grade. 
The materials were to be stories from the Iliad, the 
Odyssey, the ^Enead, the sagas, the Niebelungen Lied, 
and stories of King Arthur, Roland and Hiawatha. 
For the fourth grade there were biographies of characters 

1 Report, Committee of Twelve, 174-175. 

2 Gordy and Twitchell, Pathfinder in American History, Boston, 1802- 
1893. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 1 53 

prominent in Europe and America. For the grades 
above the fourth the arrangement was the same as that 
proposed by the Committee of Seven for the four years' 
course in the high school. Numerous suggestions, for 
the most part inspired by the culture-epoch theory, 
came from teachers in normal schools. Miss Emily 
J. Rice proposed the correlation of history and literature 
with such constructive activities as the building of 
models of primitive houses and the reproduction of primi- 
tive arts and inventions. 1 Charles A. McMurry pro- 
posed a combination of topics in European and American 
history enriched by readings from literature. 2 Kemp 
proposed for the first grade the primitive Aryans ; for 
the second grade the ancient Egyptians, Hebrews, and 
Phoenicians ; for the third grade the Greeks ; for the 
fourth grade the Romans ; for the fifth and sixth grades 
English history, and for the seventh and eighth grades 
American history. 3 Bliss proposed primitive civilization 
for the first four grades, selected topics in history and 
legend from Charlemagne to Napoleon for the fifth and 
sixth grades, and American history, with some references 
to Europe, for the seventh and eighth grades. 4 
All of these programs have stood the test of some actual 

1 Course of Study in History and Literature, Chicago, 1898. 

2 Special Method in History, New York, 1904, p. 238-268. 

3 E. W. Kemp, An Outline of History for the Grades. 

4 Bliss, History in the Elementary Schools, New York, 191 1. 



154 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

experience, but the extent to which they have been 
applied is difficult to determine. Of fifty-three repre- 
sentative American cities, investigated in 1909, nearly 
one half had American history from the fifth grade on 
through the eighth ; one had English history in the fifth 
grade, 6 in the sixth grade, 19 in the seventh grade, and 

7 in the eighth grade ; one had general history in the fifth 
grade, 5 in the sixth grade, 11 in the seventh grade, and 
6 in the eighth grade ; one had French history in the fifth, 
sixth, and seventh grades ; 4 had local history in the fifth 
grade, 9 in the sixth grade, 6 in the seventh grade, and 

8 in the eighth grade. 

Such were the conditions when, in 1909, the report of 
the Committee of Eight appeared. This Committee, 
which had been appointed four years earlier by the 
American Historical Association, undertook to do for 
history in the elementary school what the Committee 
of Seven had accomplished for history in the secondary 
school. The Committee recognized the need on the 
part of elementary teachers of special guidance and 
presented, in addition to suggestions on modes of treat- 
ment, a full syllabus of history for an eight years' course, 
including references to books. The Committee also 
made special suggestions for the teaching of civics from 
the fifth grade on through the eighth. The program 
was as follows : 



IN THE UNITED STATES 



155 






First grade. Indian life. Stories connected with Thanksgiving 
day and Washington's birthday. Stories con- 
nected with local events. 

Second grade. Indian life. Thanksgiving day. Washington's 
birthday. Local events. Memorial day. 

Third grade. Heroes of other times : Joseph, Moses, David, 
Ulysses, and so on to Columbus. The In- 
dians. Independence day. 

Fourth grade. Historical scenes and persons in American his- 
tory, colonial period. 

Fifth grade. Historical scenes and persons in American his- 
tory continued. Great industries of the pres- 
ent. 

Sixth grade. European background of American history. 
Selected topics from Greek, Roman, and Eu- 
ropean history to the end of Raleigh's colonial 
enterprises in America. 

Seventh grade. American history to the close of the Revolution. 
European background continued. 

Eighth grade. American history since the Revolution. Great 
events in European history. 

The surveys of history programs in this and in the pre- 
ceding chapter inevitably invite comparison and raise 
questions somewhat disquieting to American teachers. 
The position of history in the schools of the United States 
is, it is clear, far less favorable than its position in the 
schools of continental Europe. In the latter, history 
forms almost invariably a coherent, continuous course 
required of all pupils. The preparatory stages are 
completed at an age two or three years earlier than in 



156 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the United States. In the secondary schools of Ger- 
many, Austria, and France, ancient history is presented 
to children of ten or eleven about as systematically as it 
is presented in the first year of American high schools. 
In the elementary schools of the same countries, national 
history is treated about as systematically for children of 
ten or eleven as it is treated in the United States for chil- 
dren of twelve or thirteen. The history programs of 
^continental Europe are, as a rule, more skillfully organ- 
ized than the history programs of the United States, 
and leave more connected impressions of history. These 
differences are indicated by the bare outlines to which 
the present description has of necessity been limited. 
They would be more apparent if there were space for 
details. 

The problem presented to makers of history programs 
is more difficult in the United States than in Europe. 
There is with us no central authority to impose programs 
upon the country as a whole. Our organization of sec- 
ondary education differs radically from that of Europe. 
A Frenchman, some years ago, discussing at a conference 
in Paris the teaching of history in the secondary schools 
of the United States, began his address with the remark 
that there were no secondary schools in the United States, 
and then proceeded to give an account of the teach- 
ing of history in American colleges as the nearest equiv- 



IN THE UNITED STATES 157 

alent of the French lycees. 1 The work of secondary 
schools in Europe does, as already pointed out, usually 
include the equivalent of our first two years of college. 
But it includes also grades of instruction classed in the 
United States as elementary, and in its preparatory 
classes, even the lowest grades of elementary instruc- 
tion. The course in history can, therefore, be planned 
for a continuous period, ranging in boys' schools from 
eight to twelve years, and in girls' schools from five to 
ten years. A similar unit might be formed in the 
United States by including in one view history for both 
the elementary school and the high school. But since 
the Madison Conference this has not been seriously 
attempted. The elementary school has formed one 
unit, the high school another. Even if the two could 
be combined, the conditions would be less favorable 
than in Europe. In Europe programs for secondary 
schools can be formulated on the assumption that 
pupils are qualified for serious study. Those who lack 
either taste or ability for learning will presumably not be 
encouraged to remain. Our general theory has been 
that classes and masses do not exist, that there should 
be one kind of instruction good alike for those who 
have the desire and the ability to learn and for those who 
have not, good alike for boys and for girls, good alike 

1 Conference dn Musee Pedagogique, 1907, p. 99. 



158 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

for those who drop out at the end of the elementary 
period, or earlier, and for those who go on to the high 
school. 

Under the circumstances a certain conservatism in the 
planning of history programs for American schools is to 
be expected. One of the first decisions of the Madison 
Conference was that no attempt should be made to form 
an ideal program. "The Conference was unanimously 
of the opinion that it would suggest nothing that was not 
already being done in some good schools." x A similar 
spirit seems to have dominated all cooperative efforts 
to improve the history program for American schools. 
Very considerable changes have, it is true, from time 
to time been proposed. Textbooks had to be rewritten 
to conform to the recommendations of the Committee 
of Seven. They are now being rewritten to conform to 
the recommendations of the Committees of Eight and 
of Five. But all of these committees sought precedents 
in actual American practice. 

The history program cannot escape the limitations 
imposed by our general system of school organization. 
But in some other respects it is barely possible that our 
committees have been moved by an excess of cau- 
tion. In dealing with a subject like history it is barely 
possible that an ideal course of eight years for the ele- 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, 167. 



IN THE UNITED STATES 1 59 

mentary school, or of four years for the high school, 
would be no more difficult to establish than courses of 
eight or of four years, confessedly not ideal. To induce 
Nebraska or California to do what some good schools in 
Massachusetts or New York are already doing, to induce 
Massachusetts or New York to do what some good 
schools in Nebraska or California are already doing may, 
after all, involve difficulties equal to those of inducing 
them to examine a history program on its merits. Since 
textbooks are with us the all-important guide in his- 
torical instruction, and since publishers have shown 
the utmost goodwill in meeting new demands, it would 
seem, on the whole, entirely safe for any committee likely 
to be authorized by the American Historical Association 
to walk in the light of its own best judgment as to what 
an eight years' course or a four years' course ought 
really to be. 

At the present time history seems to be losing rather 
than gaining in favor with school administrators. The 
demand is for social studies of direct and immediate 
concern to individual communities. Questions relating 
to public health, to housing and homes, to good roads, 
and the like, in the present, are coming to be viewed as 
of greater importance than questions relating to how 
people lived in the past. The educational perspective 
is rapidly changing. It is becoming increasingly clear 



l6o TEACHING OF HISTORY 

that children should know something about the duties 
of the garbage collector and the gas inspector; it is 
becoming less clear that they should know something 
about the deeds of Alexander and of Charlemagne. 
Attention is now being focused more definitely than 
ever before upon vital present problems, and there is a 
growing tendency to ask of history primarily and chiefly 
that it contribute to an understanding of these problems. 
The question then becomes, not what in the past is im- 
portant in representing and explaining the past, but 
what in the past is important to us. Current programs 
and current textbooks are severely criticised because 
they do not properly subordinate history to this most 
recent use of history. Already the movement has called 
into being a committee, and a preliminary report has 
already been published. The committee, we are in- 
formed, intends to outline five unit courses as follows : 

(i) Community civics and survey of vocations. 

(2) European history to 1600 or 1700 (including English and 
colonial American history). 

(3) European history since 1600 or 1700 (including contem- 
porary civilization). 

(4) United States history since 1760 (including current events). 

(5) Economics and civic theory and practice. 1 

1 Committee on Social Studies, National Education Association. 
For the preliminary report see History Teacher's Magazine, December, 
1913, p. 291-296. 



CHAPTER VI 

The Biographical Approach to History 

The field with which the teacher of history has to 
deal offers as units of instruction individual human 
beings and groups of human beings. Facts relating to 
the former make up the special subject matter of biog- 
raphy. Facts relating to the latter make up the sub- 
ject matter of history proper. School instruction in 
history may begin with either, but group units are, in 
most cases, regarded as at least the ultimate goal. 
Pupils, that is, are at some stage expected to study 
Athens, the Roman Empire, the Christian Church, the 
American people, and individual Athenians, Romans, 
Churchmen, or Americans, only as these appear to be 
needed for the illustration or explanation of Athens, the 
Roman Empire, the Christian Cnurch, or the Ameri- 
can people. A choice between individuals as units and 
social groups as units is, therefore, ordinarily presented 
only in the earlier stages of instruction. The usual 
view is that history for children should begin with indi- 
viduals as individuals, but that the subjects should be so 

M 161 



1 62 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

selected and so treated as to prepare for a study, later 
in the course, of social groups. This mode of procedure 
may be described as the biographical approach to his- 
tory. 

The use of biography for beginners appears to have 
been first suggested by Rousseau. Biography itself 
as an independent form of literature was then compara- 
tively new. "Lives" had, of course, been produced, 
both by antiquity and by the Middle Ages. Indeed, 
the earliest appearance of the word "biography" in the 
English language seems to have been Dryden's use of it 
in 1683 to describe the famous Parallel Lives by Plu- 
tarch. Both the original of the word and its applica- 
tion to "lives" must be credited to the Greeks. But 
most of these earlier "lives" lacked the true fei«j»ra]lhi- 
cal motive. They were either accounts of the "times" 
written after the manner of histories in general, or, if 
more personal, were designed to celebrate moral quali- 
ties, to impress solemn warnings, to defend or defame a 
character, to win support, or to inspire opposition, to 
a doctrine or policy, rather than faithfully to portray 
the life of a man. It was not until Dryden's own cen- 
tury that any considerable part of the literary world 
^ began to demand from writers of "lives" primarily a 
truthful record of lives and to recognize clearly a dis- 
tinction between biography and history. 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 63 

Rousseau proposed a truthful record for Emile. He 
would have men exhibited as they really were. That 
was his one reason for resorting to biography. Emile 
was to begin his "study of the human heart" with the 
reading of "individual lives," because in them men are 
more fully revealed than in narratives of broader scope. 
In them "it is in vain for the man to conceal himself, 
for the historian pursues him everywhere ; he leaves him 
no moment of respite, no corner where he may avoid the 
piercing eyes of a spectator." x The study of the past 
was, however, to begin for Emile at the relatively 
mature age of eighteen. It was, then, a study appar- 
ently beyond the usual bounds even of a secondary 
schawl course. Could biography be adapted to lower 
stages of instruction? Was it desirable for lower stages 
of instruction? 

The questions were raised by Basedow and other 
early supporters of Rousseau, but nearly fifty years 
passed before educators began to return definitely favor- 
able answers in the form of actual programs. In the 
process the fundamental postulates of Rousseau, that 
men should be exhibited as they really were, and that 
"individual lives" are to be preferred to more general 
narratives because of their fuller revelations of men, were 
all but forgotten. There was a distinct tendency to 

1 Emile, Payne's Translation, 215-216. 



1 64 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

revert to older conceptions of biography, to regard 
"lives" as vehicles for conveying lessons in morals and 
patriotism, to seek illustrations, not of life, but of ideals 
of living. There was another modification. Rousseau, 
while demanding sober facts, placed no emphasis upon 
the study of individuals as a preparation for the study 
of social groups. Later advocates of the biographical 
plan, with less regard for "lives" as truthful portraiture, 
had much to say of biography as a bridge to history, 
and some of them eventually reached the conclusion 
that history of any kind desirable for school can and 
ought to be reduced to biography^ 

The introductory biographical survey began to appear 
with some degree of frequency in German programs soon 
after 1820, and in the course of the next thirty or forty 
years gradually established itself in the world at large 
as the usual approach to history. There was some 
competition between biography and myths and sagas. 
Advocates of the culture-epoch theory naturally preferred 
the latter. But even in culture-epoch programs biog- 
graphy was, in some cases, combined with myths and 
sagas.\ Biography has remained, down to the present, 
the usual introduction to history. \ 

In its completed form the argument for biography 
rested, and still rests, upon the following general propo- 
sitions : 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 165 

(1) The individual person is a simpler subject to study 
than the tribe, city, or nation to which he belongs. 

(2) Children have a natural and healthy interest in 
persons ; they live and suffer with their heroes and thus 
enlarge their own experience in a manner scarcely to be 
thought of in dealing with social groups. 

(3) Acquaintance with the great and noble characters 
of the past creates a desire to be like them and makes 
the evil deeds of evil men abhorrent. 

(4) Individuals can be made to represent social 
groups, so that a study of the characteristics and experi- 
ences of individuals is in effect a study of the character- 
istics and experiences of social groups themselves. 

Advocates of biography emphasize, of course, the 
need of careful selection. IjThe individual person is a 
simpler unit for study than the social group to which 
he belongs. It does not follow that the individual per- 
son is himself necessarily either simple or interesting, or, 
if both simple and interesting, that he is either a desir- 
able example to place before children or a fair represent- 
ative of his social group. 

Each country naturally includes its own leaders and 
heroes. Most countries include also at least some 
characters of world fame or of world infamy. These 
are in a measure privileged subjects to be admitted with 
or without reference to any fixed conviction as to the 



1 66 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

kind of person most readily adapted to the intelligence of 
children. In the selection of other subjects the stand- 
ards most generally in evidence are those supplied by 
the doctrine of natural tastes and interests, or by the 
culture-epoch theory. For children up to the age of ten 
or eleven there is in consequence a liberal represen- 
tation of persons of primitive instincts — - cavemen, 
Indians, and the like — and of persons of various in- 
stincts who "did things," especially brigands, pirates, 
adventurers, explorers, pioneers, generals, and kings. 
Artists, inventors, builders, captains of industry, and 
other "doers" of the less adventurous sort are to' some 
extent recognized, and there are occasional references 
to writers, preachers, philanthropists, philosophers, 
teachers, and even professional scholars. In the main, 
the demand is for "plenty of action," and this usually 
implies action that savors somewhat of the spectacular. 
Subjects and treatment frequently transcend the limits 
of strict biography. Fictitious events may be associated 
with real persons, real events may be associated with 
fictitious persons, events and persons may be alike 
fictitious. The essential condition is the use of stories 
told in biographical form. It is, then, quite possible 
to construct characters that move exclusively in realms 
peopled by the supposed interests of children. The 
characters may themselves be children and may easily 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 67 

be assigned roles in which they play their full parts 
without "the ignominy of growing up" and thus growing 
out of their proper sphere. 1 For children beyond the 
age of eleven or twelve, both subjects and treatment are, 
as a rule, more strictly biographical. But action is 
still the ruling principle. | 

The length of the introductory biographical survey 
varies greatly. In France it is completed at the end 
of the third year. In England it is often carried to the 
end of the seventh year, and sometimes to the end of 
the eighth year. In the United States many programs 
carry it to the end of the sixth year. Both in Europe 
and in America there are occasional demands that it 
should be carried even into secondary instruction. 

National leaders and heroes and the somewhat mixed 
company of other characters associated with them in the 
school curriculum are, perhaps, less generally intelligible 
and less generally interesting than is commonly supposed. 
Often they are presented so abstractly that children 
can find little with which to live and suffer except vague 
adjectives and broad generalizations. If the presenta- 
tion were in all cases concrete, if the characters could in 
all cases be made to stand out as real persons, it is more 
than probable that many a program would undergo some- 
what radical revision. Those tales of fighting, killing, 
and other forms of physical violence, that even now 



1 68 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

occasionally shock the sensibilities of children, would, 
if properly realized, shock them still more, and some 
other tales would be found to convey very doubtful ethi- 
cal lessons. 

\For moral and patriotic purposes the chief stress is 
naturally and properly laid upon "highly endowed" 
and "nobly striving" men.V The general principle is 
that "if we walk with those who are lame, we learn to 
limp" and "if we associate with princes, we catch their 
manners." ["I fill my mind," said Plutarch, "with the 
sublime images of the best and greatest men.'l To 
fill the minds of children with images of the same kind, 
and to make these images factors in the adjustment and 
regulation of everyday conduct, is commonly regarded 
as the supreme aim of biography in school. iThe pupil 
is "to feel that these heroic characters are not romantic 
ideals to which he cannot approach, but facts and 
forces of everyday practical life. Progressively he 
becomes touched with the feeling of debt he owes to the 
mighty workers of the past, and more and more sees 
that every hero of history is as near to him as his next- 
door neighbor, and constitutes a large portion of the 
daily bread of his entire spiritual life. Out of the in- 
spiration which he draws from these perpetual founts of 
greatness arise a breadth of view and a moral energy 
which give him power and purpose within the line of 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 69 

his pursuits and the circle of his influence to become 
himself as truly a benefactor of mankind. It is the fine 
task of the teacher to give him the inspiring thought, 
that within the circle of his own work and duty he can 
be as heroic as they by being as courageous, generous, 
simple, truthful, refined, and noble ; in short, by cloth- 
ing his own acts in hero's clothes, by never flinching 
when there is need for heroic blood and brawn." * 

Such ideals many of the lives actually presented to 
children tend no doubt to promote. Even stories of 
fighting and killing can no doubt be so manipulated as 
to teach important lessons in courage, endurance, and 
love of home and country. From consequences of a 
different kind most children are, perhaps, delivered by 
the limitations of their own intelligence. They do not 
make the logical application. What they carry away 
very often is only a vague impression that certain 
characters of the past were in some obscure way either 
hopelessly good or hopelessly bad, rather stupid, and 
on the whole not sufficiently interesting to be imitated. 
This is in some cases fortunate. There are examples 
placed before children which, if really understood and 
really taken to heart, would almost certainly impair the 
discipline of the schoolroom. A pupil undertaking 
to live up to them would almost certainly be dismissed 

1 Kemp, Outline of Method in History, 267. 



I 



170 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

from school and might in time find his way to jail through 
that lack of harmony with his social environment which 
brought some hero of his to the same end. "Lives of 
great men" often "remind us" that the way to "make 
our lives sublime" is to defy established conventions. 
If relatively few children learn that lesson in school and 
apply it in undesirable ways, the fault is not in the 
examples. A few do learn it and early begin to recognize 
that the situation is saved for others by misinterpreta- 
tion. Even apparently unimpeachable examples of 
strictly conventional virtues are not always entirely 
safe. The story of George Washington and his hatchet, 
for example, has been known to produce somewhat 
melancholy results. It has actually inspired the desire to 
commit some act of depredation for the sake of an oppor- 
tunity to tell the truth like George Washington and like 
him to be rewarded. Many a child has tried the experi- 
ment and met with a treatment so different from that 
which George Washington received as to lead him to 
question very seriously whether honesty is, after all, 
the best policy. 1 jThe moral and patriotic purpose of 
biography is one to be promoted at all hazards, but the 

1 This statement is based upon the testimony of several hundred 
teachers. The author has himself rather mournful recollections of what 
happened in his own case when as a boy of eight he put the story to this 
kind of test. 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 171 

responsibility of the teacher is so grave that every effort 
should be made to eliminate the hazards. ^ 

The representative character of the lives presented 
in school is almost invariably linked with the "great- 
man theory " of history. The general idea is ex- 
pressed in the well-known dictum of Carlyle that 
Tthe history of what man has accomplished in this 
world is at bottom the history of the great men who have 
worked here.y * It is more neatly expressed in the 
dictum of Cousin that "great men sum up and represent 
humanity." 2 The relation here implied may be either 
the relation of a great man to his own times or the rela- 
tion of a great man to posterity. Biography when 
distinctly urged as a bridge to history commonly em- 
phasizes the former. The idea is so to present individ- 
ual characters as to typify the age in which they lived. 

An issue is thus raised which has long invited con- 
troversy. Greatness is usually associated with fame. 
Yet greatness, as defined by moralists, may utterly fail 
to achieve fame, and fame may be quite unrelated to 
moral or even to intellectual greatness. What deter- 
mines fame? The whims of fortune rather than any 
careful weighing of worth, according to Sallust; the 
place in which an act happened to be performed, accord- 

1 Heroes and Hero Worship, 1 . 

2 Quoted by Bourdeau, L'Histoire el les Historiens, 17. 



I 



172 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ing to Cato ; the talent of the writer who happened to 
record it, according to Vopiscus. 1 Often fame has come 
to men, not because they embodied the characteristics 
of their own generation, but because they did not em- 
body them, not because they were representative men, 
but because they were unrepresentative men. Often 
fame has been denied by contemporaries and has been 
bestowed by posterity. As for the famous who were 
also great, the very act of describing them as great sets 
them apart as more or less exceptional. They tower 
above the rank and file of humanity as mountains tower 
above the plains of the earth. " What would you think," 
asks Bourdeau, "of a geographer who for a complete 
description of the earth should content himself with a 
mention of the highest summits?" 2 The great-man 
theory at best suggests a description of humanity some- 
what analogous to such a geographer's description of 
the earth. 

Representative conditions and events can no doubt 
to some extent be grouped about national leaders and 
heroes. But this mode of grouping is on the whole the 
more effective the less it appeals to the great-man theory. 
To say, for example, that children can learn from the 
life of George Washington all that they need to know 

1 Quoted by Bourdeau, L'Histoire et les Historiens, 20. 

2 Bourdeau, op. cit., 14. 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 73 

about the Revolution, as has been said many times by 
exponents of the great-man theory, is to impose restric- 
tions on the treatment both of George Washington and 
of the Revolution. So much -in- n$* way directly related 
to Washington must be told to represent the Revolution, 
and so much in no way directly related to the Revolution 
must be told to represent Washington, that the result 
is usually a forced grouping which leaves Washington 
and the Revolution alike somewhat obscure. I Biog- 
raphy, on the whole, can be made more historical by 
making it more biographical, by grouping men about 
events rather than events about men, and by studying 
men first of all as men) Take the American Revolution. 
Surely not even George Washington himself is a suffi- 
ciently embracing center for making this movement 
intelligible. Nor is there any other hero of the revolu- 
tionary period who sums up in himself the characteristics 
of his age sufficiently to make his life the life of the times. 
There were many leaders and many different points of 
view. What were the determining views? Who were 
the advocates of them? What were the chief events in 
the struggle ? Who were the men associated with them ? 
There were Otis, John and Samuel Adams, Hancock, 
Hutchinson, Franklin, Dickinson, Hamilton, Patrick 
Henry, Jefferson, Washington, Pitt, Grenville, Lord 
North, and George III. What manner of men were 



174 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

they? What kind of homes did they come from? 
What educational advantages had they enjoyed ? What 
was their social position? What were their personal 
characteristics? What was their occupation? Were 
they successful in private life? Were they good neigh- 
bors? Were they seekers after public office ? Did they 
hold public positions? Who were their friends? Who 
were their enemies? What were their personal con- 
troversies and grievances? Up to this point the aim is 
merely to know the men as men, to think of them much 
as we think of our personal acquaintances. When now 
we turn to the principles and acts of the Revolution, 
and meet our acquaintances, some on one side and some 
on the other, the whole movement is humanized for us. 
We see in the conflict between England and the colonies 
opposing principles, but we see also opposing personal 
tastes, interests, hopes, and ambitions. We see the 
cost to some and the gain to others, among those who 
espoused, and among those who rejected, the principles. 
The principle of grouping men about great movements 
and events is applicable at any stage of instruction. At 
the beginning of the school course the teacher who so 
desires may suppress altogether the events that deter- 
mined the selection of the men, may confine attention 
to purely personal characteristics, and yet in a true 
sense prepare for an understanding of the events them- 






THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 75 

selves when later the events are presented. Farther on 
in the course, and especially in the high school, the study 
of the personal element in this personal way may with 
profit immediately precede the more formal study of 
movements or periods. With a high school class about 
to take up the Revolution, for example, one pupil may be 
asked to make the kind of personal study of Otis that is 
indicated by the questions in the preceding paragraph, 
another of John Adams, and so on to the end of the list. 
Two or three lessons would be sufficient to dispose of the 
entire list. Similar studies may be made of the men 
who became prominent in public life between 1812 and 
1830, and again of the generation that fought out the 
issues of 1 86 1. The same plan can be applied to great 
movements in European history. Such studies imply, 
of course, the use of facts and not of fiction. Characters 
y greatly distorted for moral or patriotic ends can serve 
no very definite historical purpose. 

Again, the grouping of men about events suggests 
more strongly than the grouping of events about men a 
sense of proportion and the possibility of so arranging 
biographical stories as to convey some impression of 
continuity. The condition of cultivating a sense of 
proportion is to select conditions and events that were 
characteristic and important and so to treat the partic- 
ular men associated with them as to bring out charac- 



176 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

teristic qualities. The condition of developing an idea 
of continuity is to make use of stories that have some 
relation to each other and in each story to make use of 
incidents that have some relation to each other. These 
conditions are rarely met by the introductory biographi- 
cal surveys in school programs^ Even where the charac- 
ters selected are in general significant from the point of 
view of history the stories have as a rule little or no 
connection. Usually there is not even a pretense of 
combining the materials into a continuous story. In the 
plan of the Committee of Eight, for example, and this is 
fairly typical of biographical plans in general, children 
in the first grade catch glimpses of Miles Standish, of 
Samcset and Squanto, and of George Washington. In 
the second grade they have a little more of George 
Washington, something of Richard Henry Lee, and 
"selected stories of Civil War heroes." In the third 
grade they meet heroes of other times ; Joseph, Moses, 
David, Ulysses, Alexander, Cincinnatus, Horatius, 
William Tell, Roland, Canute, Alfred, Robert Bruce, 
Joan of Arc, Harroun, and Columbus. In the fourth 
grade they are introduced in a somewhat more regular 
way to American explorers and colonists, but even here 
they take the leap from La Salle to Washington and 
Franklin. In the fifth grade they have selected bio- 
graphical stories from American history beginning with 



THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 1 77 

Patrick Henry and ending with Lincoln and Robert E. 
Lee, but again there is little to suggest a continuous 
story. . Such an arrangement leaves much to be desired 
if biography is to be used as a real preparation for 
history. V 



CHAPTER VII 

The Study of Social Groups 

The distinction between biography and history which 
has grown up since the seventeenth century does not 
imply that the study of individuals has been completely 
differentiated from the study of social groups. Prac- 
tically all works recognized as histories, from Herodotus 
down to the present, have been in part biographical. 
Most of them are in a measure subject to -the charge of 
summing up humanity in terms of that relatively small 
number of individuals to whom the opinion of the world 
has awarded the crown of greatness, or at least of fame. 
Kings, generals, popes, bishops, and other officials in 
church and state, painters, sculptors, builders, and 
other creators. of "great and marvelous works," orators 
on great public occasions, writers on great public ques- 
tions, have as a matter of course been described. The 
difference is in the relative emphasis and general point of 
view. Biography, in the modern sense, aims primarily 
to depict the individual as an individual and recounts 
his service, or disservice, to the social group, to indicate 
his importance as an individual. History aims primarily 
178 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 79 

to depict the social group and deals with the acts, opin- 
ions, and characteristics of individuals, primarily for the 
purpose of illustrating or explaining group conditions 
and activities. There are, however, recent biographies 
that aim to set forth both the "life" and the "times," 
and there are recent histories, especially of the class 
concerned with smaller social groups — histories of 
towns, of cities, of counties, — that reduce the "times" 
to a series of biographical sketches. 

When history first began to find its way into the 
school curriculum, it presented itself, in the main, as 
an account of political and military events. Leaders and 
heroes figured conspicuously, for politics and war inevi- 
tably produce "outstanding characters." But the point 
of view was not consciously biographical. The life to be 
portrayed was, so far as it went, group life, the life of 
nations, of principalities, of empires. This, in addition to 
being the kind of history that had commonly been writ- 
ten by historians, was a kind of history easy to organize 
and easy to arrange in the form of a connected narrative. 
It was, moreover, a kind of history that brought together 
a great many facts of the highest importance. 

Almost from the beginning, however, there was a 
demand for a larger view of the field for school purposes. 
The demand was plainly voiced by Comenius. It was 
repeated again and again by later reformers, and, toward 



180 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the close of the eighteenth century, began to make some 
impression upon school programs. Early nineteenth 
century conditions were somewhat unfavorable. The 
Napoleonic wars and the new patriotism tended to 
establish more firmly political and military history. 
Later the development of the biographical approach to 
history, with its insistence upon action and picturesque- 
ness, tended to fix attention upon political and military 
leaders. But materials for a different kind of school 
history were, in the meantime, being made more acces- 
sible. The way was opened about the middle of the 
eighteenth century by Voltaire. His Steele de Louis XIV 
was the first attempt in historical literature to portray 
the whole life of a period. His Essai sur les Mceurs, 
setting forth the moral, social, economic, artistic, and 
literary life of Europe, from Charlemagne to Louis XIII, 
was the first attempt to produce a real history of civili- 
zation. In Germany, Winckelmann looked to ancient 
art for a revelation of the Greek mind ; Heeren traced 
the development of commerce; Moser, in his history 
of Osnabriick, furnished a model of social history, and, 
incidentally, discovered the peasant. Herder dealt 
with the folk soul, and Schlosser, in his Weltgeschichte, 
undertook a broad survey of the world. When Carlyle 
in 1830 asked "which was the greatest benefactor, he 
who gained the battles of Cannae and Trasimene or the 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS l8l 

nameless poor who first hammered out for himself an 
iron spade," the nameless poor already had a consider- 
able place in historical literature. Carlyle wished to 
enlarge it. "From of old," the historian had, he pro- 
tested, too often "dwelt with disproportionate fondness 
in senate houses, in battle fields, nay, even in king's 
antechambers," forgetful of the rest of the world, 
"blossoming and fading whether the 'famous victory' 
were won or lost." A different and higher conception 
was now expected, and there were signs of a time coming 
"when he who sees no world but that of courts and 
camps, and writes only how soldiers were drilled and 
shot, and how this ministerial conjurer outconjured that 
other . . . will pass for a more or less instructive gaz- 
etteer, but will no longer be called an historian." x 

If these brave words were forgotten in Carlyle's later 
work, and if he wrote, after 1840, precisely the kind of 
history which he had condemned in 1830, Macaulay was 
more consistent. The perfect historian sketched by 
Macaulay in his essay on History, published in 1828, 
"shows us the court, the camp, and the senate. But he 
shows us also the nation. He considers no anecdote, no 
peculiarity of manner, no familiar saying, as too insig- 
nificant for his notice which is not too insignificant to 
illustrate the operation of laws, of religion, and of educa- 

1 Essay on History. 



1 82 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

tion, and to mark the progress of the human mind. 
Men will not merely be described, but will be made 
intimately known to us. The changes of manners will 
be indicated, not merely by a few general phrases or a 
few extracts from statistical documents, but by appro- 
priate images presented in every line." * This idea 
Macaulay sought faithfully to realize in his History of 
England, the first two volumes of which appeared in 
1848, and the enormous popularity of the work was due 
in large part to success in achieving his ideal. The 
History was translated into the language of every 
civilized country and was read by all classes. Among the 
numerous testimonials which reached the author was a 
vote of thanks, carried at a meeting of workmen, "for 
having written a history which working men can under- 
stand." 2 

The widening horizon of historians began to be per- 
ceptible in school instruction in Germany about 1850. 
Weber's Lehrbuch der Weltgeschichte, published in 1847, 
was the work of a practical schoolmaster and grew out 
of his work as a teacher of history. It illustrated the 
possibility of summing up in a comprehensive survey, 
without neglecting either politics or war, the history of 
art, literature, science, religion, philosophy, and general 

1 Essays, three-volume edition, I, 306. 

2 Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, 301. 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 83 

cultural conditions. This work in the course of forty 
years passed through twenty editions and became the 
basis of innumerable textbooks for schools. It seems 
to have been the original model of most American text- 
books in the field of general history. 

About i860 Kulturgeschichte began to assume the 
proportions of a general issue. In that year Biedermann 
published an essay of forty-five pages on The Teaching of 
History in School, its Defects, and a Proposal for a Remedy. 
The defects which Biedermann saw were that history 
consisted of a mere succession of events and that its 
method was mere narration. History of this kind, in his 
opinion, exercised the memory only and overloaded that, 
much to the confusion of the understanding. It left 
the pupil almost entirely passive. "Shall history in 
school," he asked, "describe merely actions and, as 
performers of them, great personalities, or shall it con- 
cern itself with the general conditions of a time or 
people, shall it deal exclusively or chiefly with external, 
so-called political history (war, battles, treaties of peace, 
conquests, distributions of provinces, regents, generals, 
diplomats, etc.), or shall it deal also with the inner life 
of the people, . . . shall it present events in mere suc- 
cession or according to their organic relations?" l The 

1 Der Geschichtsimterricht in der Schule, seine Mangel und ein Vorschlag 
zur Abhilfe. 



1 84 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

answer was that history in school should be a study of 
civilization. 

In Germany, for the remainder of the century, the 
Kulturgeschichte issue aroused almost continuous, and at 
times angry, debate. Kulturgeschichte proved a term 
difficult to define. To the schoolmaster it meant in 
general concrete illustrations of the non-political aspects 
of civilization. To the historian it might mean a blend- 
ing of psychology and sociology, a study of the social 
consciousness, the social mind, the social soul. Lam- 
precht, a leading advocate of the latter view, has de- 
clared that political history merely inquires with Ranke 
how it happened — "wie es eigentlich gewesen?" 
Kulturgeschichte asks how it became — "wie es eigent- 
lich geworden?" The one is narrative in method, the 
other is genetic. 1 The outstanding fact, so far as school 
instruction is concerned, is that, during the last quarter 
of the nineteenth century, the scope of history programs 
gradually broadened until, both in Germany and in 
other countries, the non-political aspects of civilization 
won recognition as at least an indispensable part of 
surveys of history for schools. To-day there is in all 
countries emphasis upon social and economic history, 
with a tendency, especially marked in the United States, 
to exalt the common man and the common life. 

1 Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, 588. 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 185 

The changes thus indicated in conceptions of history 
for schools reflect political, social, and economic changes 
in the world at large. The growth of democracy with its 
ideals of equal opportunity for all and the welfare of the 
whole tended naturally to shift interest from leaders and 
heroes of the old type to the masses, and to the men and 
measures that have forwarded the improvement of the 
masses. The industrial revolution created a new world 
and brought home to historians, as never before, the 
significance of past industrial life. One result was the 
economic interpretation of history, a search for explana- 
tions of human development in "the hard daily work on 
earth" rather than in "the shifting clouds of heaven." 
A new industrial situation demanded a new industrial 
education and led to a searching reexamination of the 
whole educational system, with demands for readjust- 
ment, amounting, in some cases, to revolution. A new 
social consciousness and new conceptions of social effi- 
ciency developed. School instruction in history has, in 
consequence, been called upon to impress the lesson that 
progress comes through cooperation, acting together, 
thinking of the social welfare. It has, in common with 
other subjects, been called upon to socialize the pupil, 
to counteract the selfish instincts natural to the young, 
to show that no one can live for himself alone, that each 
will live better for himself by living for others. All of 



1 86 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

/ these influences have, as a matter of course, pointed to 

i the study of group conditions and activities. School 

! history has not been called upon so generally as might 

have been expected to make the social world really 

intelligible, but the social consciousness of our time seems 

to be leading us in that direction. 

The study of group life as a whole is naturally more 
difficult than the study of group life as expressed in 
politics and war. Activities conducted by govern- 
mental agencies authorized to command obedience and 
able to exact it have a unity and continuity relatively 
easy to discern. They can even be described without 
taking much account of the characteristics either of 
the groups that command or of the groups that obey. 
A view of group life as a whole imposes at the outset the 
\ need of some analysis of the group. No human group 
is entirely homogeneous. It is a familiar fact that even 
within a small group, within a single family, there may 
be widely different abilities, tastes, interests, conduct, and 
character. The larger the group, the greater the varia- 
tions. "The English nation comprises Welsh, Scotch, 
and Irish ; the Catholic Church is composed of adherents 
scattered over the whole world, and differing in every- 
thing but religion. There is no group whose members 
have the same habits in every respect. The same man 
is at the same time a member of several groups, and in 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 87 

each group he has companions who differ from those he 
has in the others. A French Canadian belongs to the 
British Empire, the Catholic Church, the group of 
French-speaking people." * 

The search for characteristics common to any large 
social group is a complicated undertaking. The tend- 
ency is to assume that habits and usages practiced in a 
conspicuous manner by a part of the group characterize 
the group as a whole. This is often strikingly illus- 
trated in the treatment of nations, the groups most 
frequently in evidence in school instruction in history. 
We learn that Americans love the almighty dollar, that 
the Germans love scientific truth, and that the French 
love humanity; that the English "stick to it," that the 
Scotch have no sense of humor, and that the Spaniards 
never do to-day what they can put off until to-morrow. 
Such dominant national characteristics, it has been 
urged, should stand out as the dominant facts in the 
teaching of history and should be vividly impressed 
upon the minds of the pupils. Picture, for example, a 
tempestuous night in London and a cabman sitting 
erect and serene on his box, oblivious of raging wind, rain, 
lightning, and thunder, as ready for a fare as under the 
most smiling of skies. That, according to a well-known 

1 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 239- 
240. 



1 88 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

American lecturer on education, is England, and there 
is the secret of England's greatness. 

The objection to such sweeping summaries of national 
traits is not only that they attribute to an entire group 
the characteristics of a part of the group, but that they 
imply an absence of those characteristics in other na- 
tional groups. The love of money did not, of course, 
begin in America and is not peculiar to American citizens. 
If with us the chase for the almighty dollar is on the 
part of those engaged in it more active than in Europe, 
it may be merely because on this side of the Atlantic 
there are more dollars to chase. There are, of course, 
non-Germans who love scientific truth and Germans 
who do not, non-Frenchmen who love humanity and 
Frenchmen who do not, non-Englishmen who "stick to 
it" and Englishmen who do not, non-Scotchmen who 
are defective in their sense of humor and Scotchmen who 
are not, non-Spaniards who procrastinate and Spaniards 
who do not. England personified in a cabman is effec- 
tive as a mode of presentation. The induction is marred 
by the possibility of duplicating it on precisely the same 
grounds for almost any other country. There are 
cabmen in Paris, in Munich, in Berlin, and even in New 
York and Chicago, who may be observed sitting equally 
erect and serene through night and storm. 

Schools that now introduce the study of social groups 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 89 

at the beginning of the course in history usually start 
with the family, pass on to the school, and then out to 
the community in which the school is situated. The 
materials and treatment, as actually managed for young 
children, are, on the whole, simpler and more intelligible 
than those afforded by the more common biographical 
approach. The simplification is at times extreme. 
Children of six are in some cases formally taught that 
they eat at tables, sleep in beds, have fathers, mothers, 
sisters, brothers, friends, and toys. Schoolroom experi- 
ences, the school playground, and the concrete facts of 
school organization offer equally obvious illustrations 
of group conditions, activities, and relations. The 
community outside of the school may be introduced 
either through studies of individuals who perform 
special social service, or through a study of some special 
trade, art, or industry, related to the immediate neigh- 
borhood. In the first case, the study may begin by 
following on their rounds the milkman, the grocer's 
delivery clerk, the street cleaner, the garbage collector, 
the postman, the policeman, the doctor. Gradually 
expanding in scope it may in time make the children 
conscious of classes in the community and give them 
general views of occupations, industries, commerce, 
manners and customs, food, dress, amusements, and 
whatever else may be considered suitable for illustration 



190 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

of group life. In the second case, the starting point 
may be a factory near the school, or some industry from 
which a considerable number of homes in the neighbor- 
hood derive their income. In a small community there 
is often some overshadowing economic interest. The 
source of wealth may be very largely oil, or coal, or 
wheat, or potatoes, or broom-corn. The way is then 
entirely clear. In a large community the problem is 
complicated by the greater diversity of economic inter- 
ests, but the principle of selecting what touches the 
daily life of the homes in the neighborhood can still 
to some extent be applied. 

Materials of this concrete character relating not only 
to present but to past group conditions and activities 
in the community can be introduced as early as the first 
grade. They can be so selected and so treated as to 
convey even to a first grade rudimentary ideas of change 
and of continuity, and, incidentally, of the nature of 
historical evidence. For children living on Manhattan 
Island, for example, the work may begin with a glance 
at changes visibly in progress in the neighborhood of the 
school, old buildings disappearing, new buildings being 
erected, families moving out of and into the neighbor- 
hood, shops going out of business, shops opening for 
business. These readily suggest questions that carry the 
children back to a time when there were no buildings 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 191 

like those we now see, when there were no shops, no 
street cars, and not even streets ; a time when there were 
no people like ourselves living on the island. Hints of 
how the island then looked are still conveyed by occasional 
bits of virgin soil. Other hints can be given through 
pictures and through the use of the sand table. Two or 
three lessons will be sufficient to sweep from the island 
the white man and all his ways and open up the long ago 
of Indian occupation. Most first-grade children have 
already heard of Indians. If asked how they know 
Indians once lived on Manhattan Island, they will some- 
times answer that they have heard stories about Indians, 
and sometimes that they have actually seen bows and 
arrows and tomahawks, used by Indians. The list of 
relics can easily be extended. The next step is to form 
a picture of Indian life: dwellings, food, work, play, 
weapons, tools, ornaments, clothing, painted faces. 
There should be a visit to the Museum of Natural 
History. There should be photographs and models in 
the classroom. The children can themselves construct 
an Indian "house" and imitate simple Indian industries. 
Let them develop from the "house" some of the prob- 
lems of Indian life in such a "house." How would they 
sleep ? how sit down ? how get out and in ? how eat their 
meals? how keep warm in winter? where store food? 
where do the cooking? Let them consider in a similar 



192 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

way occupations outside of the "house," hunting, fishing, 
gardening, always keeping clear what Manhattan Island 
itself was like, the water surrounding it, vegetation, kinds 
of game and fish. The picture is completed by the tell- 
ing of stories which Indians told about themselves. 

So far the lessons have dealt almost entirely with 
conditions. The events celebrated in Indian tradition 
are obscure and in the main improbable. The condi- 
tions of Indian life have, it is assumed, been compared 
and contrasted with the conditions under which the 
children themselves live. We now turn to events, the 
first and greatest of which is the coming of the white 
man. There is at this stage no occasion for any refer- 
ence to Europe or to the question of how Europeans 
discovered America. The white men may be allowed 
to burst upon the vision of the children as they burst 
upon the vision of the Indians. The ideal arrangement 
would be to take the class up Riverside Drive and follow 
Hudson's progress up the river in Juet's narrative. 
Juet, the children should be informed, was there. 1 To 
the story as he told it should be added the story as told 
by the Indians themselves and written down long after- 
ward by a white man. 2 

1 Original Narratives of Early American History } Narratives of New 
Netherland, Scribner's, 16-28. 

2 Higginson, American Explorers, 290-296. 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 93 

The contact between Indians and white men suggests 
numerous questions of interest to children. How did 
they manage to talk with each other? What would 
white men coming up the river for the first time want to 
know? What signs would they make? What answer- 
ing signs would the Indians make ? Did the Indians have 
a real language? What was it like? The information 
is either directly supplied by early narratives or readily 
inferred from them. 1 Attention is again called to the 
appearance and customs of the Indians as set forth in 
accounts written by white men, and the children are 
made conscious that it is through these accounts we 
learn most of what we know about Indian life on Man- 
hattan Island. 

With the establishment of the Dutch on the Island 
another chapter of life opens, to be developed in a manner 
similar to that suggested for the study of the Indians, 
with the addition of incidents illustrating the relations 
between the Dutch and the Indians, and comparisons 
and contrasts between Dutch and Indian life. The 
corning of the English can be treated in the manner sug- 
gested for the coming of the Dutch and can be followed 
by an account of life in early New York similar to that 
proposed for Dutch and Indian life. Under a skillful 
teacher the three phases can be compassed by a first 

1 See Narratives of New Netherlands 
o 






194 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

grade in a single year and can be so bound together as to 
make a connected story. 

For children who begin in the lower grades with biog- 
raphy and reach in the upper grades the study of social 
groups, work of a somewhat more ambitious character 
is possible. The community is, let us say, one in which 
the chief agricultural product is broom-corn, and the 
chief local industry, the manufacture of brooms. A 
considerable proportion of the inhabitants are engaged 
in raising broom-corn, in buying and selling broom-corn, 
or in making brooms, and many of the children in the 
school are already looking forward to one or the other of 
these occupations. The study may then begin with the 
broom-corn producing group, the conditions of planting 
and harvesting, the appearance of the crop, the mode of 
transporting it to market, and the money it brings. 
The producers, it is observed, have a considerable amount 
of leisure. They crowd the public square of the town 
on a Saturday afternoon for no other purpose apparently 
than that of indulging their social instincts. On Mon- 
days they come to town again in large numbers to do 
their trading. The crop seems to be profitable. Bank 
accounts are so common that interest on deposits ceased 
long ago. From the producers, the study may pass on to 
dealers in broom-corn, the conditions of buying, storing, 
and selling, and then on to the factories in which brooms 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 195 

are made, the workers, the machinery used, the output. 
The relations of the groups to each other, to the com- 
munity, and to the world beyond the community are 
easily illustrated. One season a few buyers attempt a 
"corner" in broom-corn. The price advances rapidly 
from $90 a ton to $200 a ton. This is highly gratifying 
to the farmers. The factories raise the price of brooms. 
This is not gratifying to consumers of brooms. Some 
dealers and some owners of factories begin to look to 
other countries for raw material. One dealer discovers 
broom-corn in Bohemia and imports a cargo at a cost of 
less than $100 a ton, with a prospect of being able to 
secure more later at a cost of $60 a ton. Thereupon the 
member of congress representing an American broom- 
corn district introduces a bill providing for a duty on 
broom-corn to protect American industry. A wide 
range of social, economic, and political conditions can, 
it is evident, be explained by broom-corn alone. 

Having been made duly conscious of group conditions 
and activities dependent upon broom-corn in the present, 
the pupil is prepared to understand group conditions 
and activities dependent upon broom-corn or other prod- 
ucts in the past. The step, as already noted, is at- 
tended with some danger of confusion to the historical 
sense. There is an inborn tendency to carry the en- 
vironment of the present into the past. The deeper the 



196 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

consciousness of the present, the stronger the inclination 
to transport it, especially when, as is very often the case, 
teachers lay great emphasis upon resemblances between 
past and present. Resemblances should not be over- 
looked, but the corrective furnished by emphasis upon 
differences between past and present should also be 
constantly applied. 

The study of social groups on the relatively small 
scale thus far indicated admits, without great difficulty, 
of connected views and of a continuous, concrete narra- 
tive of development. The study of groups on a larger 
scale, the life of nations, to say nothing of the life of 
humanity as a whole, is quite a different matter. The 
application of the point of view to history in general is 
limited for some peoples, especially those of the remoter 
past, by the inadequacy of available sources. The daily 
life of some countries can scarcely be known at all. 
For other peoples it is limited by the very abundance of 
materials. Kulturgeschichte dealing with the thoughts 
and feelings of a generalized social soul is admittedly 
barred from the elementary and secondary school, and 
the massing of details for a series of pictures has thus 
far failed to achieve coherence, sequence, connection, 
continuity. 

Biedermann saw the difficulty and tried to meet it. 
Beginning with children of ten he proposed to sum up 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 97 

German history in twelve Kulturbilder, as follows : 

(1) Germans at the beginning of the Christian era; 

(2) the Frankish kingdom, 500; (3) the Carolingian 
kingdom, 800 ; (4) German kingship in the tenth cen- 
tury ; (5) the fall of German kingship in the thirteenth 
century ; (6) the triumph of the provincial princes in the 
fourteenth century; (7) beginnings of reform, 1500; 
(8) end of religious strife, 1555; (9) Peace of West- 
phalia, 1648; (10) accession of Frederick II, 1740; 
(11) end of the Empire, 1806, or the Congress of Vienna, 
1815; (12) contemporary conditions. The plan was to 
make each picture a fairly detailed representation of 
social conditions and to bridge the intervals by looking 
back from each picture to the preceding picture, noting 
the differences, and then seeking, in the intervening 
period, the causes of any change in conditions sug- 
gested by such differences. 1 

Biedermann's plan simplifies the problem of selection. 
It provides the pupil with definite material, and, what is 
still more important, gives him something, beyond mere 
memorizing, to do with the material after it has been 
presented. German critics have, indeed, complained 
that it gives the pupil too much to do, that it puts an 
unreasonable strain upon his self-activity. There is 

1 Biedermann, Der Geschichtsunterricht auf Schulen nach Kulturge- 
schichtlicher Methode, 23-45. 



198 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

the further objection that the manner of connecting the 
pictures does not achieve real continuity. 

Various other plans for organizing the material have 
been proposed. Cultural conditions have been sur- 
veyed in the order suggested by the culture-epoch theory. 
This brings together peoples in the same stage of develop- 
ment without regard to chronology or geography and is, 
perhaps, the most confusing, to the historical sense of 
pupils, of all arrangements. Special forms of social 
development have been singled out for separate treat- 
ment in different years of the school course — the history 
of the family and the home in one year, the history of 
mechanical inventions in another year, the history of 
intellectual life in still another year. This has the 
merit of securing orderly sequence for each special 
form of development, but at the expense of those rela- 
tions to other forms of development so essential to any 
clear conception of social groups. 

For the organization of history as a whole, including 
the political as well as the non-political factors in civiliza- 
tion, some comprehensive scheme of classifying facts 
is indispensable. A somewhat rigid view of institutions 
has been proposed. "An examination of the life of any 
people," says Professor Mace, "will reveal certain per- 
manent features common to the history of all civilized 
nations. There will be found five well-marked phases, — 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 1 99 

a political, a religious, an educational, an industrial, and 
a social phase. These are further differentiated by the 
fact that each has a great organization, called an institu- 
tion, around which it clusters, and whose purpose, plan 
of work, and machinery are peculiar to itself. For 
political ideas the center is the institution called govern- 
ment ; for religious ideas, the church ; for educational 
and culture influences, the school ; for industrial life, 
occupation ; and for social customs, the family." 
These "five lines of growth," it is urged, "move on 
down through the life of a people and give linear con- 
tinuity to the subject, and, therefore, a clue to the 
method of its organization." l 

The field is more fully exhibited in a classification 
"founded on the nature of the conditions and of the 
manifestation of activity," proposed by Langlois and 
Seignobos, as follows : 

I. Material Conditions, (i) Study of the body: A. Anthro- 
pology (ethnology), anatomy, and physiology, anomalies and 
pathological peculiarities. B. Demography (number, sex, age, 
births, deaths, diseases). (2) Study of the environment: A. Natural 
geographical environment (orographic configuration, climate, 
water, soil, flora, and fauna). B. Artificial environment, forestry 
(cultivation, buildings, roads, implements, etc.). 

II. Intellectual Habits (not obligatory). (1) Language (vo- 
cabulary, syntax, phonetics, semasiology). Handwriting. 

1 Mace, Method in History, n, 14. 



200 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

(2) Arts: A. Plastic arts (conditions of production, conceptions, 
methods, works). B. Arts of expression, music, dance, literature. 

(3) Sciences (conditions of production, methods, results). (4) Phi- 
losophy and morals (conceptions, precepts, actual practice). 
(5) Religion (beliefs, practices). 

III. Material Customs (not obligatory). (1) Material life: 

A. Food (materials, modes of preparing, stimulants). B. Clothes 
and personal adornment. C. Dwellings and furniture. (2) Private 
life: A. Employment of time (toilette, care of the person, meals). 

B. Social ceremonies (funerals and marriages, festivals, etiquette). 

C. Amusements (modes of exercise and hunting, games and spec- 
tacles, social meetings, traveling). 

IV. Economic Customs. (1) Production: A. Agriculture and 
stock-breeding. B. Exploitation of minerals. (2) Transformation, 
Transport and industries: technical processes, division of labor, 
means of communication. (3) Commerce: exchange and sale, 
credit. (4) Distribution: system of property, transmission, con- 
tracts, profit sharing. 

V. Social Institutions. (1) The family: A. Constitution, 
authority, condition of women and children. B. Economic organ- 
ization. Family property, succession. (2) Education and in- 
struction (aim, methods, personnel). (3) Social classes (principle of 
division, rules regulating intercourse). 

VI. Public Institutions (obligatory). (1) Political institutions: 
A. Sovereign {personnel, procedure). B. Administration, services 
(war, justice, finance, etc.). C. Elected authorities, assemblies, 
electoral bodies (powers, procedure). (2) Ecclesiastical institu- 
tions (the same divisions). (3) International institutions: A. 
Diplomacy. B. War (usages of war and military arts). C. Pri- 
vate law and commerce. 1 

1 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 
234-23S- 



THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 201 

This classification, while intended primarily for his- 
torians, is of use also to teachers. It indicates at a 
glance the scope of the field. It furnishes hints of pro- 
cedure in selecting and arranging facts. The treatment 
of history in American schools must, for the present, 
follow the lead of the textbooks and find its main thread 
of continuity in political activities. But, in adding other 
facts, and in organizing them about that thread, the 
teacher, at least in the high school, may aim to take a 
view of what society is and how society works, as com- 
prehensive as that suggested for historians. 



CHAPTER VIII 
Making the. Past Real 

However history may be conceived, and whatever 
may be the aims set up for historical instruction, the 
fundamental condition of making history effective in the 
classroom is to invest the past with an air of reality. 
The condition is itself fairly obvious and has, since the 
eighteenth century, been almost continuously impressed 
upon teachers. It is to-day summed up in countless 
assertions to the effect that history should be made 
"vivid" and "alive." The general process involved is 
clear. To make the past real is to image material 
conditions and events and to reproduce in ourselves 
some semblance of the mental states that determined 
these conditions or events or were determined by them. 

The most effective appeal to the sense of reality is, of 
course, through reality itself. "A walk through Nor- 
mandy," says John Richard Green, at the opening of his 
chapter on Normandy and the Normans, "teaches one 
more of the age of our history which we are about to 
traverse than all the books in the world." 1 "A walk 

1 Short History of the English People, 71. 
202 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 203 

through Normandy" is a privilege reserved for the few, 
but a walk through some Normandy is possible for all. 
Every community offers at least the community itself, 
a local geographical environment, local remains, and 
local customs. Everywhere materials are provided 
for making the local past real. The community may, 
it is true, be one in which nothing of importance to the 
world at large ever seems to have happened. The richer 
the associations, the better. Better the Seven Hills of 
Rome for an outlook upon world history than any 
number of hills that may be counted from a cross-roads 
school in America. But all ground associated with 
human life is in a true sense historic ground. All prod- 
ucts of human art or industry are historic products. 
All human customs are historic customs. The radius 
of fame is not the only measure of the significance of a 
community in the teaching even of world history. Any 
local past properly realized, not only contributes in a 
general way to a feeling of reality in dealing with the 
larger past, but supplies specific elements for recon- 
structing the larger past. This is not the only reason 
why teachers and pupils in any community should 
know the past and present of the community, but it is a 
sufficient reason. 

There is need of emphasis here. Teachers of history in 
unfavored communities are sufficiently aware that 



204 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

teachers of history in favored communities should not, 
and probably do not, neglect local resources. Yet 
favored communities are no more real than unfavored 
communities. The need of building historical knowledge 
upon the direct personal experiences of the pupil is no 
greater in the one case than in the other. In every 
community there should be, not merely such casual use 
of the local past and present as may happen to occur to 
the teacher, but a systematic search of local resources 
for points from which the pupil may begin his journeys 
to the past and to which he may return. 1 The result 
should be an added sense of the reality both of the past 
and of the present and the kind of communion between 
past and present which, in the language of some present- 
day educators, makes history "function." 

In many communities the field open to direct explora- 
tion is greatly enlarged by the presence of material 
consciously collected, consciously preserved, or con- 
sciously constructed to represent past realities. There 
are museums that contain actual relics, and models of 
relics, of different ages and countries. There are gar- 
dens, parks, monuments, homes with their furniture and 
interior decoration, churches and various other kinds of 

1 A good example of the systematic use of the community is furnished 
by Edgar Weyrich, Anschaidicher Geschichtsunterricht. The community 
is Vienna. 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 205 

buildings, that reproduce conceptions developed and 
applied in other times by other communities. Few 
teachers are likely to be so blind as the one who is re- 
ported to have carried on an elaborate discussion of 
Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian columns, without dis- 
covering, or leading her pupils to discover, that the 
entrance to their own schoolhouse was flanked by 
striking, though somewhat crude, examples of the Doric 
order. Most teachers are likely to make at least casual 
reference to such materials. But here again the refer- 
ences should be systematic and persistent. 

The materials, it must be confessed, are not always 
readily accessible. Even museums may fail to reflect 
a distinctly historical motive. They may be designed 
for the convenience of sight-seers rather than for the 
convenience of students of history. Many outsiders 
have looked with envy upon such arrangements as those 
of the National Museum in Munich, or of the Northern 
Museum in Stockholm, or, on a smaller scale, of the 
invaluable Mercer collection in Doylestown, Pennsyl- 
vania, arrangements that enable the observer to follow 
step by step historical development. Stockholm has in 
addition an outdoor museum, an inclosure of some 
seventy acres, showing Sweden in miniature, hills and 
valleys, brooks, ponds, woods, fields and pastures, flora 
and fauna, and, what is still more interesting, actual 



206 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

dwellings from different districts and periods, with their 
actual furnishings and with attendants dressed in the 
costumes of the districts and periods represented. Some 
features similar to these are now being added to the 
grounds set apart for the Doylestown museum. They 
illustrate possibilities far more inviting than those 
with which most teachers of history must be content. 
But directors of museums are now, as a rule, keenly 
interested in the problems of the schoolroom and will- 
ing, to the full limit of their powers, to cooperate 
with teachers. Often temporary rearrangements of 
materials, and even the temporary enlargement of 
special collections through loans, can be secured for 
the asking. Furthermore, the school can itself be 
made a repository of local antiquities, or at least 
of materials that will some day become local an- 
tiquities. 1 

Appeals to reality within the community can and 
ought to be supplemented by appeals to reality beyond 
the community. This suggests, of course, visits to other 
communities and introduces difficulties which, in the 
opinion of many American teachers, are insurmountable. 
The use of purely local resources involves a large expen- 
diture of time. The use of resources beyond the horizon 

1 See Page, A Working Museum of History, in History Teacher's Maga- 
zine, V, 77-80. 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 207 

of the community involves in addition the expenditure 
of money. In Europe first-hand studies of the com- 
munity itself and of neighboring communities have 
been greatly facilitated by making school excursions a 
part of the regular curriculum, by utilizing holidays, 
and by taking advantage of low railway fares. The 
longer school excursion, as developed by Professor Rein, 
is prized for the reality which it imparts to geography, 
nature study, history, and other subjects, It is prized 
also for the open-air exercise which it affords, for the 
initiative and freedom which it makes possible for pupils, 
for the opportunity which it creates for social training ; 
in a word, for advantages which we commonly associate 
with school athletics. In the United States conditions 
are less favorable and school excursions of any kind are 
less common than in Europe. The average school year 
is shorter than in Europe, the general theory of holidays 
and vacations does not, as in Europe, and especially in 
Germany, encourage tours of useful exploration, and 
travel is more expensive. We attach, moreover, no 
such value to excursions as is attached to them in Europe. 
School visits to museums and to places of historic 
interest within and without the community are, however, 
increasing, and the custom of allowing school time for 
shorter excursions is gaining in favor. 
Further assistance in reconstructing the material past 



208 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

is supplied by numerous aids to visualization designed 
specifically for use in school. Here are included casts, 
models, pictures, maps, charts, and diagrams. The 
need of such aids was clearly set forth as long ago as the 
eighteenth century, and has been almost continuously 
emphasized ever since. In Europe the response has 
been so generous that there is now scarcely any known 
phase of past civilization which is not represented. In 
the United States, until recently, the chief reliance has 
been on maps and pictures, but other aids are now 
coming into use. The American Historical Association 
led the way with an exhibit in New York in 1909. The 
History Teacher's Magazine for February, 1910, carried 
an account of this exhibit to teachers in every section 
of the country and thus spread information which up to 
that time had been mainly confined to observers of 
history teaching in Europe. Other similar exhibits 
followed, notably that of the New England History 
Teachers' Association, now a permanent feature of the 
Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Two important pieces of 
work remain to be done. The first is to prepare a really 
exhaustive guide to aids especially adapted to American 
schools. The second is to provide a series of illustrative 
exercises showing definitely when and how the aids ought 
to be used. As matters stand at present many schools 
seem to be wasting their substance in the acquisition 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 



^uy 



of unsuitable material and wasting their time in unsuit- 
able use even of suitable material. 

For obvious reasons casts and models of actual relics 
offer a nearer approach to the originals than any other 
form of representation. By means of them, innumerable 
smaller objects can be reproduced, substantially in every 
detail, and may, for all purposes except the purely 
aesthetic, be as serviceable as the originals. Larger 
objects can be similarly represented on a reduced scale 
and may thus in some cases be more manageable than 
the originals. A battlefield, for example, may in its 
actuality be so large and so complicated as to be difficult 
to compass even when one is on the ground. A good 
model may bring all the essentials within a single sweep 
of the eye. Usually, however, reduced models are 
necessarily less serviceable than the originals. Some- 
times they are so diminutive that they degenerate into 
mere toys. A model of the Colosseum covering an area 
no greater than that covered by a silver dollar is not 
impressive. 

The most effective and the most accessible models 
thus far produced are of German manufacture. The 
Hensell models (26 pieces), illustrative of Greek and 
Roman history, are occasionally found in the classical 
departments of American colleges, but seem rarely 
to have been used with classes in history. They are 



2IO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

suitable either for the elementary school or for the high 
school. Models of special interest in this series are a 
typical Roman house, and types of wearing apparel 
used by the Greeks and Romans, with a small lay figure 
for displaying the apparel. A larger and better model 
of a Roman house, and a life-size figure for displaying 
wearing apparel, are included in the Rausch and Blumner 
series. The Gall and Rebhann models of objects con- 
nected with ancient history are also excellent. The field 
of German history, from prehistoric times to the nine- 
teenth century, is admirably covered by the Rausch 
models, representing more than two hundred different 
objects, most of them as suitable for illustrating general 
European history as for illustrating German history. All 
of the models to which reference has been made are con- 
structed with scrupulous regard for accuracy. Smaller 
objects are reproduced in the exact size, shape, and color 
of the originals, and sometimes in the very kind of 
material from which the originals were constructed. 
Models of larger objects are carefully made to scale. 
It is, unfortunately, impossible to point to any similar 
series illustrative of American history. 

Ordinary pictures are more abstract than models. 
They cannot, like models, be seen from different stand- 
points that introduce different backgrounds. A single 
picture of a person or object is, therefore, necessarily 



MAZING THE PAST REAL 211 

incomplete. An impressionist painter, we are informed, 
needs twenty canvases, numerous changes of position, 
and all the changes of light from sunrise to sunset to 
portray adequately a hayrick. 1 The number of can- 
vases that would be needed to portray adequately a 
human being is not stated, but the principle would seem 
to require a still greater number. Some painters have 
met the condition by exhibiting on a single canvas dif- 
ferent "poses " of the same person. Some photographers 
who advertise their ability to make us "see ourselves 
as others see us" are now willing to take us in triplicate, 
and even in larger groups of ourselves. Pictures are 
really less simple and less obvious than they seem, and 
treatises on how to look at them are by no means super- 
fluous. 

Pictorial illustration has long been a familiar feature 
of American textbooks in history. There has, how- 
ever, frequently been a lack of connection between the 
picture and the text and a rather general lack of en- 
couragement to pupils to use the picture. It is still 
rare to find in textbooks the kind of verbal description 
of the picture that is needed to make it really intelli- 
gible. A much better arrangement is found in his- 
torical albums of the kind common in Europe. Lavisse 
and Parmentier's Album Historigue, a work in four 

1 Adams, Exposition and Illustration in Teaching, 337. 



212 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

volumes, covering the field of European history, may be 
cited as an example. The plan here followed is to group 
subjects for comparison and contrast. The pictures 
illuminate the text and the text illuminates the pictures. 

Europe has passed us also in wall pictures designed, 
like maps, to be seen by the entire class. Especially 
noteworthy are Lehmann's Kulturgeschichtliche Bilder 
fur den Schulunterricht, and Cybulski's Tabula quibus 
antiquitates Graced et Romance illustrantur. The pictures 
in both of these series are constructed with minute 
attention to accuracy of detail, and are reproduced in 
colors. Inferior to these, but still useful, are Lavisse 
and Parmentier's Tableaux d'histoire de la Civilization 
Francaise, and Longman's historical wall pictures illus- 
trating English history. 

When we enter the more general field of picture post- 
cards, photographs, illustrations in newspapers, maga- 
zines, and books, lantern slides, and the like, there is 
for almost every country an embarrassment of riches. 
The stereoscope, too, once a familiar object on many a 
parlor table, has won a new and wider recognition, and 
special efforts are now being made by such extensive 
producers of stereographs as Underwood and Underwood 
to serve the interests of the classroom. The stereo- 
graph has the merit of giving the effect of three dimen- 
sions and an impression of size and distance similar to 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 213 

that obtained by the natural eye in the position from 
which the picture was taken. Above all, the moving 
picture machine has entered the school and now promises 
to revolutionize the visual aspects of history. A fore- 
taste of what is to come is afforded by the Edison kinet- 
oscope, a combined stereopticon and moving picture 
machine, now on the market at a moderate price. 

Maps, charts, and diagrams do not, like models and 
pictures, represent reality directly. They show, as a 
rule, relations rather than actual objects. When we 
say of a few lines on the blackboard, "That looks like 
France," we mean usually that the lines resemble other 
lines which have come to be associated with France. 
A photograph of France would, of course, look rather 
different. A diagram may be entirely arbitrary — a 
blue rectangle to represent a republican administration 
and a pink rectangle to represent a democratic adminis- 
tration, a dash of orange to indicate the triumph of 
protection and a dash of green to indicate the demand 
for free trade. It may, by means of lines, triangles, 
rectangles, or circles, represent with mathematical 
accuracy the populations and areas of different states, 
quantities and values of manufactured products, the 
strength of armies, the cost of education, the length of 
reigns, the duration of ideas and the extent of the terri- 
tory over which they have prevailed. It may be in 



214 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

part pictorial. The French army may, for example, be 
represented by a Frenchman in uniform, the Russian 
army by a Russian in uniform, the latter being as much 
larger than the Frenchman as the Russian army is 
larger than the French army. Again, it has been said 
of one country that each farmer carries two soldiers on 
his back. The picture diagram maker expresses the 
idea by drawing a farmer to life and putting two sol- 
diers in uniform on his back. 

. Maps, charts, and diagrams should, in general, aim 
at simplicity and should avoid all unnecessary elabora- 
tion. Outside of an atlas, in which one naturally ex- 
pects to find everything, a map, for example, should be 
\ so constructed as to focus attention upon the special 

facts of immediate concern in a particular history 
lesson. This end is often best attained by suppressing 
all other details. A few lines on the blackboard are 
often sufficient, and often make a stronger appeal than 
a complicated map or diagram. The simplest sort of 
chalk mark will frequently catch the "wandering eye" 
after the wandering ear has ceased to respond to any- 
thing connected with the lesson. Experienced teachers 
who understand this often use the blackboard to illu- 
minate situations for which verbal description alone 
might seem entirely adequate. The statement, for 
example, that Queen Caroline served as an intermediary 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 215 

for important communications between Walpole and 
George II presents a fact presumably intelligible with- 
out elaborate explanation. It may, however, fail to 
interest a class and may pass quite unheeded. A dia- 
gram is almost sure to arrest attention. Let A rep- 
resent Walpole, B, Queen Caroline, and C, George II. 
" The natural way of communicating with the king 
would have been for the minister to speak directly 
to him ; but as a matter of fact, important communi- 
cations usually took the route indicated by the arrows." 1 

A--___ 

Many teachers would no doubt consider such an 
illustration superfluous, but the principle involved is 
one that deserves to be pondered. 

School history, to be made real and kept real, should 
begin with realities which can either be observed directly 
or which can be represented directly, and should con- 
tinue throughout the school course to provide frequent 
opportunities for appeals to such materials. But 
when all is said the fact remains that most of the reali- 
ties with which the teacher has to deal are on exhibition 
in verbal description only. Children, like the rest of 
us, must depend mainly upon words for impressions 

1 Adams, Exposition and Illustration in Teaching, 389. 



2l6 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

even of the externals of life in the past. The teacher 
is at every stage confronted by the difficulties inherent 
in passing from words to realities, and it is largely be- 
cause these difficulties are not generally and clearly 
recognized that school instruction in history is so often 
ineffective. The choice of facts is important from the 
point of view both of educational aims and of the abili- 
ties of children. But no facts that have their begin- 
ning and end in empty words and phrases can be of 
much consequence. 

Precisely here lies the root of our worst offending in 
teaching history to children. We begin early in the 
grades a liberal use of vague adjectives and of broad 
generalizations. We deal in summary notions, in ab- 
stractions, in figures of speech, sometimes unconsciously, 
more often under the delusion that short headings of 
short chapters made of short sentences of short words 
shorten the difficulties of historical instruction. We 
present to children of ten or eleven "a wicked king, 
John Lackland," "the most wicked king England ever 
had," and the barons at Runnymede compelling "the 
wicked king to promise to give up all his evil practices." 
We show Lorenzo the Magnificent failing, in spite of 
his title, to enrich Florence, making it only "grander 
and more famous by his administration," and complet- 
ing "that subversion of the Florentine Republic for 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 217 

which his father and grandfather," neither of whom 
need be further described, "had so well prepared the 
way." Thus we establish no doubt the association of 
kingly wickedness with John ; thus we suggest no doubt 
that Lorenzo had his faults. But what is the wicked- 
ness of kings to children of ten or eleven, and what, 
within their power of realization, were the faults of 
Lorenzo? The phrases are quoted from recent books 
designed to make history especially simple for children, 
and they are typical of much of our recent effort to serve 
that benevolent purpose. 

It is easy to be misled here by the appearance of 
interest. There may be interest in things seen " through 
a glass darkly." The degree of interest may even vary 
inversely with the degree of intelligibility. Many chil- 
dren, and many adults, dwell with special fondness upon 
words and phrases to which they attach little or no 
meaning. The very vagueness of kingly wickedness 
and of subverted republics may stir the interest of 
children. Some obscurities are necessary and even 
desirable. There are realities that children ought not 
to realize. There are others that may be left obscure 
for the mere joy of discovering in later years what some 
teacher or textbook really meant by certain queer 
medleys of words that lodged in our memories because 
they were queer. But, with all allowance for exceptions, 



2l8 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the area of unreality traversed by children in their his- 
tory lessons is altogether too large. Their conception 
of the past too often is that of the pupil who was asked 
if she could tell what sort of looking man Alexander 
the Great was. "Why, no," was the answer, "I thought 
he was just one of those historical characters." There 
are too many of "those historical characters" in history 
even in the high school. 

To point out the defect is to suggest the remedy. 
History throughout the elementary course should 
abound in concrete details for visualizing persons, situa- 
tions, events. In meeting this condition even trivialities 
are permissible. Facts spurned by the standard his- 
torians may furnish the very touch needed to make the 
misty immortals of history really human. There is a 
place for the hat that Napoleon wore at Leipsic, the 
color of the waistcoat that graced the person of Daniel 
Webster when he replied to Hayne, and, in spite of a 
recent intimation that such a fact has no place in his- 
tory at all, even the color of the horse that bore Wash- 
ington at the Battle of Monmouth. The point is not 
that details of this character are important as history. 
No sensible teacher would think of having them memo- 
rized by pupils. They are details to be used for the 
moment to stimulate the sense of reality and then to 
be laid aside. The picture fades; the sense of reality 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 2IO. 

remains. On the same principle there is a place jor 
even trivial details relating to what "those historical 
characters" thought and felt. 

The remedy is simple, but where shall details be 
found? There are books for younger children con- 
structed on the correct principle. They abound in facts 
sufficiently concrete and sufficiently spurned by stand- 
ard historians. Unfortunately they are, very often, 
facts that ought also to be spurned by teachers on 
grounds of historical conscience. The ordinary text- 
books for older children make little pretense of offering 
particulars. For really suitable material the teacher 
must usually turn to contemporary literature, especially 
letters, diaries, and personal reminiscences, to a field, 
that is, which the average teacher, under present con- 
ditions, has little opportunity or inducement to culti- 
vate, and one that demands some critical ability to cul- 
tivate with profit. Many useful extracts, and many 
clues to additional material, may, however, be found 
in the ordinary source books. 

There is another difficulty. Assuming that the 
teacher has mastered the art of accumulating details, 
how shall time be found for introducing them? The 
course in history is usually fixed. There are certain 
designated topics to cover and a limited number of 
hours in which to cover them. In many cases the work 



220 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

mapped out for a given month or a given year can be 
completed only by reducing it to a bare outline. Such 
conditions are discouraging, but not altogether hope- 
less. It is not essential that even all elementary history 
be reduced to particular individual facts. There must 
be summaries, there must be generalizations. But 
these have many elements in common and may be so 
ordered that when one summary or one generalization 
has been properly based upon its supporting particu- 
lars there will be other summaries and other generaliza- 
tions for which the process need not be repeated. They 
will have a meaning sufficiently definite and real with- 
out it. Something can, therefore, be done to vitalize 
the most crowded outline. More ought to be possible. 
At a moderate estimate half of the topics included in an 
average course in the United States might with profit 
be excluded. The remaining half could then be treated 
with some degree of fullness. This principle has already 
been applied in France and is one of the secrets of the 
present effective teaching of history in France. We 
cling to our conventionalized collections of generalities, 
and when some pioneer gives us a different treatment in 
the form of a relatively big book about a few matters of 
importance and interest to the children of to-day, we miss 
the familiar generalities, and, for the rest, declare that so 
big a book cannot be completed in a single year. 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 221 

Special devices for utilizing details are, of course, not 
entirely strange to American practice. In the elemen- 
tary school much is made of dramatizing history. In 
the best form of this kind of exercise the children them- 
selves compose the drama and afterward act it. When 
this is done with proper material it is a valuable exer- 
cise, well worth the time which it takes. It compels, 
through the demands of stage setting and costumes, 
attention to the very materials that are needed for 
visualization. One class in preparing a drama on Alfred 
the Great found at once difficulties in the way of having 
the traditional prince wear every day "his crimson 
velvet suit." That led to a new sense of reality. All 
of us know how boys delight to play Indians, and many 
of us have witnessed plays on Indian life that were 
really illuminating. But the general tendency is to 
base such plays upon imaginative rather than upon 
historical material. Often the plays are ready-made 
and these are less effective for the purpose. 

Another common device for "living the past" is to 
have children write letters. Let them imagine them- 
selves in Tarrytown, for example, at the time of the 
capture of Major Andre, and let them write to some 
imaginary friend in New York an account of the inci- 
dent and of how it might have affected them. One 
teacher, some years ago, found this plan so effective 



222 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

that she proposed to keep a seventh grade in history 
occupied wholly with letter writing. 

Still another device is to have the children keep 
diaries. Let them imagine themselves in Boston in 
April, 1775, and let them record what they might have 
seen or heard during that month. Such an exercise 
will often make even dry official records absorbingly 
interesting to a seventh or eighth grade. 

An exercise formerly more in vogue than at present, 
and somewhat influenced by the old-fashioned school 
reader, consisted in learning and reciting famous 
speeches. It was an event to be remembered, when, 
with a proper historical setting given by the teacher, 
one eighth-grade boy came forth as Hayne and another 
as Webster in selections from the great debate. 

These are but illustrations of possible ways of making 
the past real through details of a kind that would ordi- 
narily have no place in the history lesson. Many, per- 
haps most teachers, would here lay the chief stress on 
imaginative material, on what we call historical novels 
and historical poems. A distinction should be made 
between novels and poems that are contemporary with 
the conditions and events described and those that 
represent later attempts at reconstruction. The former 
have often a high value as illustrations of the spirit or 
atmosphere of their times. The value of the latter for 



MAKING THE PAST REAL 223 

history may easily be exaggerated. Some novelists 
have more genius than some historians, but historical 
novels as a class are scarcely such miracles of recon- 
struction as the claims often made in book reviews, and 
in papers read at teachers' gatherings, might lead one to 
infer. Their rather general use in school history has 
been due in part to the tradition which so long made 
history a mere branch of literature, and in part to more 
general acquaintance with this kind of material than 
with material more distinctly historical. 

If, during the elementary period, the sense of reality 
has been stimulated as it may and ought to be stimu- 
lated, history in the high school can be essentially 
generalized history. There will still be need of descend- 
ing to particulars, and on occasion, even to trivialities. 
Whatever the nature of the training, there is danger at 
every stage of school instruction of leaving the impres- 
sion that history deals with a mere succession of dis- 
embodied acts and sentiments. But, in the high school, 
particulars included for the purpose of lending reality 
can, in the main, be particulars more in keeping with 
the dignity of standard historical treatises. 

The first step toward the realization of any aspect 
of the past is to realize the difficulty. With all the 
advantages of local environment, of special aids to 
visualization, and of full and accurate verbal descrip- 



224 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

tion, the reality even of the material past will continue 
in large measure to elude both pupil and teacher. 
"Nothing," says Professor Morse Stephens, "is more 
difficult than to realize existence in a bygone era. The 
perspective which years, as they roll by, give to past 
ages emphasizes certain salient points and leaves the 
background vague, and it is only by saturating the mind 
in contemporary literature, diaries, and letters, that an 
idea can be formed of the ordinary life during a past 
period. But even then it is difficult to convey to a 
reader an impression of a time in which one has not 
lived; it is more — it is almost impossible." 1 The 
teacher must none the less, like the historian, attempt 
the "almost impossible." 

1 Stephens, French Revolution, II, 361. 



CHAPTER IX 

The Use of Models and Pictures 

The primary purpose of models and pictures in the 
teaching of history is to give definiteness to visual 
imagery. This purpose may on first thought seem to 
be sufficiently accomplished by the simple process of 
exhibiting models and pictures, with appropriate labels 
or appropriate oral description. The teacher has then 
but to follow the methods of the museum, of the motion 
picture theater, or of the popular illustrated lecture. 
The pupil has but to lend his presence. Very often 
nothing more is attempted. Very often teachers do not 
appear to have discovered that any other procedure is 
either necessary or desirable. Models and pictures, 
they seem to reason, are direct representations of reality 
and make their own appeal to the eye. 

The exhibition idea is applied in a variety of ways. 
Sometimes the pupil is merely told to notice pictures in 
the textbook, or on the walls of the classroom, or in 
books to which references are made for collateral read- 
ing. Sometimes he is urged to visit museums. Some- 
times class periods are set apart at convenient intervals 

Q 22s 



226 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

for stereopticon views or for the passing of pictures. 
Sometimes models or pictures are shown in every reci- 
tation on the principle that the pupil should constantly 
see what he is talking about. 

Faith in the efficacy of mere exhibition assumes at 
times large proportions. In one prominent American 
school, a Mecca, twenty years ago, for numerous edu- 
cational pilgrimages, it was almost a ruling idea. Visi- 
tors were directed with special pride to the catalogue 
of " illustrative materials." There were post-cards, 
posters, photographs, chromos, pictures clipped from 
newspapers, from magazines, and from books, in endless 
profusion. Two complete sets of Harper's Weekly, 
covering the period from 1 861-1865, na cl, for example, 
been purchased and cut up for the illustrations. The 
collection was so comprehensive and was so carefully 
classified that materials for almost any conceivable 
topic could be brought together at a moment's notice. 
One of the chief duties of the teacher in dealing with 
any subject that admitted of this kind of illustration 
seemed to be to pass at the right moment the right pic- 
ture. A single lesson might bring into circulation the 
collections on subjects as heterogeneous as spiders, 
elephants, threshing machines, and women's hats. 
Here and there the teacher interjected comments, and 
occasionally pupils asked questions. But in the main 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 227 

the pictures appeared to be their own excuse for being. 
They were merely looked at and then passed on. This 
may be accepted as an extreme example of converting 
the class recitation in large part into a picture show, 
but it represents an ideal approximated in many of our 
most progressive schools. 

We live in a picture age. Few popular lecturers on 
any subject that lends itself to the treatment now ven- 
ture before the public without at least a stereopticon. 
Many subjects require the more lifelike motion picture. 
The multitudinous processes of nature and the mul- 
titudinous activities of humanity daily and nightly 
move across the screen in theaters, in churches, in club 
rooms, and even in private homes. 

The exhibition method has the merit of simplicity. 
It can be applied by any teacher. It furnishes under 
average conditions a certain amount of entertainment. 
It evokes for the moment a certain kind of definite 
imagery. But its value as a means of recalling reality 
is easily overestimated. What is the nature of the 
imagery? Given a model of a Roman house, does the 
pupil see the model or a Roman house? Given a pic- 
ture of Washington crossing the Delaware, does the 
pupil see the picture, or men in boats afloat on a river? 
If the images evoked are merely images of models and 
pictures, is the process of visualization complete? 



228 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Granting that models and pictures are direct represen- 
tations of reality, are they substitutes for reality? 

These questions suggest their own answer. Models 
and pictures are not entirely concrete exhibits. Most 
of them are in fact in a sense, abstractions. They are 
representations and not reproductions. They embody 
selected qualities, ranging from those of a particular 
object, place, or person, to those of a composite original. 
The Rausch model of the Gutenberg printing press 
looks like the actual Gutenberg press except in bulk. 
Abstraction, that is, is confined to size. The Hensell 
model of a Roman house represents, on the scale of one 
to fifty, a generalized Roman house, and is itself a gen- 
eralization. Degrees of abstraction similar in kind are 
presented by pictures^ Models and pictures must, 
therefore, be consciously treated as aids to visualiza- 
tion and not as objects to be themselves visualized. 
They are materials to be developed. The direct appeal 
to the eye is in most cases only a beginning. Except 
in those instances in which they reproduce not only 
the form and color, but the actual dimensions of the 
original, even models leave constructive work for the 
imagination. Imagination that reaches the realities 
which models and pictures are designed to represent 
involves mental processes higher than those of receiv- 
ing messages from the retina. 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 229 

J The first step should usually be to form a conception 
of size. Good models either smaller or larger than the 
objects which they represent are constructed to scale 
and supply, therefore, direct data. Knowing the scale, 
pupils may be asked to measure first the model and 
then the space to be embraced by the image. The result 
should, so far as conditions admit, be expressed in 
familiar terms — about the size of a penny, a lead pen- 
cil, a schoolroom chair; as large as the teacher's desk, 
the schoolroom, the school building, the school yard. 
With models representing objects of such magnitude as to 
render the actual marking out of dimensions for the image 
impracticable, there should be, in similar familiar terms, 
after measuring the model, at least a conscious attempt 
at rough approximation — a dozen times the size of the 
school building or the school yard, twice the height of 
the highest church steeple in the town, half the length of 
the longest street in town, as big as all the buildings in 
a city block put together. Ordinary pictures require 
a different treatment. A human figure in the fore- 
ground may look taller than a five-story building in the 
background. Foot-rule measure, it is evident, is here 
inapplicable. The pupil must begin at the other end 
of the problem. He must start with images of a human 
figure and of a five-story building and adjust to these 
images the elements furnished by the picture. 



230 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

The process of arriving at a conception of size, how- 
ever transparent, needs the careful attention of teachers. 
The child in a Chicago school who expressed the opinion 
that a cow was "an animal about the size of a mouse" 
had reached an entirely reasonable conclusion. She 
had observed in her school reader a picture of a cow 
and a picture of a mouse, and the one was in fact about 
the size of the other. Having seen a mouse, but never 
a cow, she naturally adjusted the pictures to her image 
of a mouse. Many children, and some adults, habitually 
read into pictures magnitudes far more innocent of 
reality than the cow and mouse example. Even with 
such precautions as are suggested by conscious and intel- 
ligent attempts to realize actual proportions the results 
are often crude. An image can with a fair degree of 
exactness be magnified to the bulk of some object in the 
schoolroom or to the bulk of the schoolroom itself. 
An image of a building twelve times the size of the 
school building is necessarily far less exact. Even in 
dealing with the simplest of units numerical compari- 
sons may convey very indefinite impressions. Merely 
to draw offhand on the blackboard a chalk line about 
twelve times the length of a given chalk line is an exer- 
cise of some difficulty for the average pupil. Fortu- 
nately, mathematical exactness in imagery is, for most 
purposes, unnecessary. It can be approximated, in 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 23 1 

cases that require it, only by actually measuring off the 
space to be embraced by the image. 
? j Having formed a general impression of size, the pupil 
is prepared for an examination of details. With a 
model or picture before him he may be told merely 
that he is to endeavor to see all the time, not the model 
or picture, but the "real thing," and that he is to report 
what he sees. He is not likely the first time such a 
task is imposed upon him, whether in the grades or in 
the high school, to see very much. The first time, and 
the hundredth time, he is likely to need the stimulus 
of guiding questions asked by the teacher. But the 
aim should be so to develop the resourcefulness of the 
pupil that he may in time himself ask the questions 
that may profitably be asked of models and pictures. 

With clear visualization the primary purpose of 
models and pictures in the history class is fulfilled. 
But there are other purposes that may and ought to be 
served. The sense of reality is important, but reality 
itself must, after all, be interpreted. It must, to be 
really useful, leave behind, not only images, but ideas. 
J Models and pictures are aids to visualization ; they may 
alsobe aids to interpretation. They stimulate imagery ; 
they may also stimulate thought. Observation, analy- 
sis, comparison, classification of data, and generaliza- 
tion should and may go hand in hand. 



232 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

We have before us, let us say, the Hensell model of a 
Roman house. We note that the scale of construc- 
tion is one to fifty. We measure the model and express 
in terms of the school building the dimensions of the 
magnified image to be formed. We endeavor to hold 
the magnified image throughout the exercise, and, as 
we go on, to adjust the various parts of the model to 
that image. We examine the model as a whole. Does 
it represent a town or a country house? Probably a 
town house. What leads us to think so? The projec- 
tion in front shows a sidewalk and a street paved with 
stones. The projection on one side shows another 
street. It seems to be a corner house. We observe 
the walls. What kind of building material do they 
represent? There are no windows in the first story. 
How does the light get in? We look in through the 
front door. Is the interior well lighted? We observe 
the roof. What are the materials and how does the 
roof slope? There are two rectangular openings. We 
look through one and see a sort of basin set in a mosaic 
floor. We look through the other and see a garden sur- 
rounded by a portico of Doric columns. We take off 
the roof. What is the general arrangement of the 
rooms? The interior seems to be divided into two 
parts. How are they connected? 

We continue our examination, with measurements 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 233 

when necessary, until we have a fairly complete image. 
We then turn to a comparison with the house in which 
we ourselves live. Is the Roman house larger or smaller 
than the house in which we live? Which has the 
greater number of rooms? How do the rooms in the 
Roman house compare in size with our own rooms? 
Which of the two houses has the greater amount of 
space for rooms? Which of the two is the more suit- 
able for a small city lot ? for a large city lot ? Why ? 
Which of the two is the more easily heated? the more 
easily ventilated ? Which has the better light ? Which 
is the more attractive to look at on the outside ? on the 
inside? Which seems to offer the greater amount of 
comfort? The Roman house appears to look in. Does 
the house in which we live look in or out? The ques- 
tions are still based on observation. Assuming some 
knowledge of general conditions, we now pass to ques- 
tions of another kind. What conditions in Roman life 
favored the Roman arrangement? Would the kind of 
house in which we live have been adapted to Roman 
conditions? Why? Would a house of the Roman 
type be adapted to conditions in our own community 
to-day? Why? Do the Romans of to-day build 
houses of the ancient Roman type? Are there in 
America such houses? 

Exercises of this general character can be made a 



234 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

feature of history teaching at any stage of the ele- 
mentary or secondary school. In the lower grades some 
of the questions would need to be made more concrete 
and more hints of what to look for would need to be 
given. But from the beginning ideas can be induced 
to flow and to find expression. . In the high school, in- 
stead of starting with the model itself, we may start 
with the textbook lesson and collateral reading. A 
chapter like that on the Roman house in Johnston's 
Private Life of the Romans may be assigned. The 
different parts of the house may then be given their 
Roman names. The uses to which the different parts 
were put can be discussed. The range of comparison, 
judgment, and generalization can be extended. High 
school pupils can be led to see quite definitely how 
Roman needs, habits, and ways of looking at the world 
determined the Roman house, and how the Roman 
house determined some Roman customs. 

The most desirable pictures are, for younger pupils, 
those that tell a story. The Lehmann wall pictures are 
preeminently of this type. One of them, for example, 
represents the interior of a mediaeval town. Before us 
lies a part of the market. We see at once that it is 
paved. We see also that it is located in an important 
quarter of the town, for the town hall looks out upon it 
and it is surrounded by imposing buildings. Near the 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 235 

town hall is a drinking fountain surmounted by a statue 
of Roland. In the background rises a cathedral and in 
the distance a castle. Hints of mediaeval life abound 
— merchants and traders, wagons loaded with goods, 
armed men on horseback in attendance ; citizens of the 
town jostling strangers ; pigs, cows, ducks, geese, and 
chickens, at large in the narrow, unpaved streets that 
radiate from the market place. The picture is in a 
measure self-explanatory and, apart from measurement, 
can be treated in the manner suggested for the Roman 
house. 

While models and pictures, properly questioned, 
furnish to a certain extent materials for their own in- 
terpretation, most of them require for really effective 
presentation a considerable range of outside information. 
For teachers who can read French and German there is 
an abundance of convenient material. Descriptive pam- 
phlets accompany the Hensell models. A complete 
and very illuminating guide to the Lehmann pictures is 
furnished by the commentary prepared by Heymann and 
Uebel. Standard French and German historical albums 
are as valuable for their descriptive text as for their 
pictures. But materials similar in scope and purpose 
are not as yet available in English. The nearest ap- 
proach to a substitute is, perhaps, to be found in the 
Baedeker guidebooks. These, for all the countries 



236 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

for which they have been issued, contain brief but 
definite descriptions of the most important places and 
remains likely to suggest themselves for representation 
in models and pictures. For additional information 
the various special treatises devoted to life in the differ- 
ent countries must be consulted. 

Often models and pictures, especially the latter, are 
designed to convey aesthetic impressions as well as infor- 
mation. They are representations of beautiful realities, 
or beautiful dreams of reality, or at least beautiful 
dreams. The emphasis is upon the adjective. The 
great artistic creations of the world, whatever their 
form, are themselves among the realities which history 
is called upon to describe. In such cases a feeling for 
beauty becomes a necessary part of the interpretative 
process, and the cultivation of a feeling for beauty an 
end to be striven for. At first this must be largely a 
matter of letting the feeling grow by what it feeds upon. 
Children are made acquainted with the appearance of 
some of the "best things" in art. Forms, proportions, 
harmony of colors, and composition are left to make such 
appeal as they can. Experiment has shown that children 
frequently learn to like the best merely by becoming 
accustomed to seeing the best. Without conscious 
analysis they begin early to recognize some of the most 
striking qualities of artistic expression and to associate 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 237 

particular qualities with particular artists. They will 
say of one picture, "That looks like a Raphael," and of 
another, ''That looks like a Botticelli." To have ad- 
vanced even to this point and to like a picture because it 
looks like a Raphael or a Botticelli is no small gain. It is, 
perhaps, as far as the appreciation of artistic achieve- 
ment need go in the history lesson in the grades, and is, 
it may be added, farther than it now goes in many high 
schools. But there may be in the. upper grades, and 
should be in the high school, some conscious analysis, 
some attempt to advance beyond the pupil's "I like it," 
or "I don't like it," towards standards of appreciation 
set up by the cultivated world, some suggestion of the 
experiences, aspirations, and special modes of expression, 
of creators of work of supreme excellence. 1 

Some persons, places, and objects, associated with 
world-significant events, some buildings, statues, and 
paintings, crowned by humanity as highest and best, 
should be so definitely impressed that subsequent rep- 
resentations of them in models or in pictures may be 
recognized at once and without labels. Pupils learn 
readily to know pictures of George Washington, of the 
Athenian Acropolis, of Westminster Abbey, of the 
Capitol at Washington, and find pleasure in the knowing. 

1 For illustrations of how this may be done see Caffin, How to Study 
Pictures. 



238 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

They should be encouraged to extend the list by exer- 
cises in identifying pictures without labels. Knowing 
one view of a building, or one portrait of a person, they 
may be tested on a different view or a different portrait. 
Knowing the portrait of a person at the age of sixty, 
they may be tested on a portrait of the same person 
at the age of twenty or of ten. A single exercise of the 
latter kind often changes materially the conception of 
portraits in general. The tendency, even on the part 
of some adults, is to see a given historical character at 
any stage of his development through some one familiar 
picture. Extending the range of the test, pupils may be 
asked to find in a collection of unlabeled pictures certain 
specified persons, or objects, or artistic creations. Going 
still further, they may be asked without any hints to 
identify all the pictures in such a collection. 

The study of models and pictures should not be con- 
fined to isolated examples. The subjects represented 
are presumably related to other subjects in the lesson. 
They should also, so far as possible, be related to each 
other. Models and pictures should, therefore, so far as 
possible, be grouped for comparative study. They 
should be used, not merely to convey impressions of 
individual objects, but to illustrate development. 

Models and pictures impose upon their makers severer 
tests of knowledge than are imposed by verbal description 



THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 239 

and, if properly used, leave more definite impressions. 
The artist who paints royal purple must show what he 
really conceives royal purple to be. He must commit 
himself definitely. If his conception is wrong, his error 
will be at once apparent to those who know royal purple. 
The writer can describe royal purple as warm or cold, 
subdued or dazzling, without revealing the fullness either 
of his knowledge or of his ignorance. It follows, so far 
as accuracy of representation is an aim in the teaching 
of history, that models and pictures should be subjected 
to criticism even more exacting than that applied to the 
text itself. This condition is frequently not observed. 
Where the text is itself uncritical, little can be expected 
of the illustrations. 'But there are numerous examples of 
critical texts accompanied by fanciful and wholly incor- 
rect illustrations. Many wall pictures and many collec- 
tions of lantern slides depict scenes quite out of harmony 
with facts. Long trains of erroneous associations are 
thus started, from which escape later is often difficult, 
and sometimes impossible. Illustrations should be 
chosen with due regard to this danger. Purely imagina- 
tive representations, significant for other reasons than 
their alleged portrayal of past realities, must frequently 
be admitted. They are themselves a part of the world's 
stock of realities. But they should be treated as imagina- 
tive representations. 



240 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Any step beyond bare exhibition in the use of models 
and pictures tends at once to limit the number that can 
be used. The ideal of illustrating everything that admits 
of illustration is objectionable even as an ideal. In the 
first place, not everything that admits of illustration 
needs to be illustrated. In the second place, a constant 
and indiscriminate procession of models and pictures 
soon ceases to illustrate. "So many things strike that 
nothing strikes." For its own sake illustration should 
be confined within bounds that not only permit, but 
encourage, the leap to reality. 



CHAPTER X 

The Use oe Maps 

Maps are representations of the whole or of parts of the 
earth's surface. They indicate location, direction, dis- 
tance, extent, area, land and water forms. They may 
indicate innumerable other conditions : elevation, air 
or ocean currents, routes of travel, areas of political or 
other control, the quantity and distribution of rainfall, 
of agricultural and mineral productions and of manu- 
factures, the volume and movement of trade, the number 
and distribution of communicants of churches, of mem- 
bers of political parties, of votes in an election, of native 
and foreign-born persons, of illiterates, of schools and 
colleges, of readers of good books, of frequenters of art 
museums, of the number or quantity, and distribution, 
of phenomena of any kind that can be counted or meas- 
ured, and located. 

Historical facts are, as we have seen, localized facts. 
They belong to particular times and particular places. 
If these relations are suppressed, the facts simply cease 
to be historical. The primary purpose of maps is to 
assist the pupil in grasping the place relation, or, to put 

R 241 



242 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the matter more generally, to assist the pupil in keeping 
history on the earth. For some purposes mere localiza- 
tion, or localization and some impression of distance, 
extent, or area, may be sufficient. That Jefferson was 
in France and not in Philadelphia in 1787 is a fact suffi- 
ciently suggestive in its relation to the framing of the 
Constitution of the United States without visualizing 
France. That a small island south of the equator 
would eliminate Napoleon from European politics more 
effectually than a small island in the Mediterranean can 
be understood without visualizing either of the islands. 
Very often, however, the facts demand definite concep- 
tions of actual geographic conditions. The physical 
background is needed to make the facts real ; it is needed 
also, in many cases, to explain the facts. 

The general use to be made of maps in the history lesson 
may seem too obvious for discussion. For a typical 
class exercise with a wall map, have, first of all, a pointer 
with a rubber tip. Place the rubber tip on or near a 
small black circle and pronounce the word "Paris." 
Move the rubber tip to and fro over a mass of pale green 
and pronounce the word "France." Follow an irregular 
black line and pronounce the word " Seine." Could any- 
thing be simpler? Probably not, nor, in many cases, 
more useless. The pupil very often locates in this way, 
not Paris, but only a small black circle on the map. 



THE USE OF MAPS 243 

Talk about Paris and he sees the circle. Talk about 
France and he sees a dash of pale green. Talk about the 
Seine and he sees an irregular black line. How often 
does he, assuming that he has not actually been in France, 
see anything else ? One exceptionally intelligent teacher 
to whom this question was put, after searching his own 
mind and the minds of his pupils for impressions left 
by maps, and finding chiefly maps, became so dissatisfied 
that he proceeded forthwith to banish maps altogether 
from his classroom and thereafter kept his geographical 
forms and relations wholly in the air. He was an ex- 
tremist, but his heart was right. He wanted his pupils 
to locate and image realities, and he recognized that to 
keep history on a map may be keeping it on the earth only 
in the sense that the map itself is necessarily on the earth. 
Exercises of the pointing type seem to be based upon 
one of two general assumptions. Either the map is taken 
to be a picture, that is, a direct representation of reality, 
or else the habit of interpreting maps is assumed to have 
been so firmly established in the geography class that 
pupils naturally carry it over into the history class. Both 
of these assumptions are at least debatable. Maps have 
pictorial features. They do convey direct impressions 
of some geographical forms. Old-fashioned maps fre- 
quently sketch actual objects, trees and animals on the 
land, and fish in the sea. But even pictures, as we have 



244 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

seen, require interpretation, and a map is ordinarily in 
most respects not a picture. It is rather a more or less 
conventionalized diagram, and its value for historical in- 
struction depends upon the manner in which it is inter- 
preted. That children in this enlightened day learn 
to read maps in the geography class may be readily 
granted, but evidence of their ability or inclination to 
read maps in the history class is often wanting. In the 
elementary school, with the same teacher commonly in 
charge both of geography and history, the geography in 
the history class ought to be at least as good as in the 
geography class. But this is by no means necessarily 
the case. An excellent sixth-grade teacher, after discuss- 
ing the mountains of France in a geography lesson, with 
the same pupils and with the same physical map of 
France, discovered in the history lesson that France is a 
level country and that this condition made the establish- 
ment of a centralized monarchy easy and natural. 

The simplest questions, and those most frequently 
asked of maps, relate to mere location. Where in the 
world is France and where in France are Paris and the 
Seine? We point to Paris on a map. Does that locate 
Paris for us? Undoubtedly, provided we have a sense 
of direction and some conception of the distance of Paris 
from our own position, provided, that is, we can supple- 
ment our pointing at Paris on the map by pointing at 



THE USE OF MAPS 245 

actual Paris and can realize the miles that separate us 
therefrom. But how many of us are accustomed to meet 
the conditions of the proviso ? For answer let the aver- 
age reader apply a few simple tests to himself. 

Direction and distance from the pupil's own position 
are both plainly involved in any definite idea of location. 
It is not enough that he should think the points of the 
compass in terms of the map, calling the top north and 
the right east. It is essential that he should feel actual 
direction. Moreover, the top of the map may or may not 
be north, the right of the map may or may not be east. 
Direction is, of course, indicated by parallels and me- 
ridians, and when these are represented as curved lines, 
the top and side idea of direction may easily prove mis- 
leading. Pupils should be trained to follow parallels 
and meridians for direction, but even then, in dealing 
with large areas, curved lines are often confusing. Direc- 
tion is grasped most easily when parallels and meridians 
are shown as straight lines. It is a good plan, therefore, 
with younger pupils, to have constantly at hand, for use 
in connection with more special maps, both a Mercator 
projection of the world and a globe. The procedure is 
simple. Let the pupil first note on the Mercator his own 
position. With one pointer placed flat against the map 
let him connect this position with the place to be located. 
With another pointer similarly placed let him indicate 




246 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the parallel passing through his own position. Thus : 
A being the pupil's own position and C the place to be 
located, AC will be the position of the first pointer and 
AB of the second. Keeping the angle and removing the 
pointers from the Mercator, it only remains to point AB 

toward the west or 
toward the east, as the 
special case may re- 
" c quire, with the angle 
in a plane parallel to the surface of the earth, to have 
AC indicate roughly the actual direction of AC. If the 
distance represented by AC is so great as to require 
allowance for the curvature of the earth, it may be desir- 
able to lay off AB and iCona globe. In any event, be- 
fore proceeding to the details of a special map, the pupil 
should have a feeling of the direction and some realization 
of the distance of C from his own position. Places near 
C can then be located by reference to their direction and 
distance from C. 

The aim of exercises of this kind, it is perhaps needless 
to state, is not to fix in memory the directions and dis- 
tances from the pupil's own position of all places and 
countries mentioned in the history lesson. A few of 
those to which reference is most frequently made should 
be thus fixed, but the chief aim is to give the pupil a sense 
of where he is in history while he is there. Nor should 



THE USE OF MAPS 247 

such exercises be repeated every time a place or country 
is mentioned. What should be done is to establish the 
habit of associating real direction and real distance with 
location. 

Other familiar questions asked of maps relate to extent 
and area. Estimates of these as represented on maps 
are usually vague. Where the differences are very per- 
ceptible pupils recognize, of course, that one coast line is 
longer or shorter than another coast line, and that the area 
of one country is greater or less than the area of another 
country. But relatively few pupils are able to recog- 
nize ratios as simple as i to 2 or 3 to 4. Still fewer can 
approximate a 1 to 4, a 5 to 6, or a 7 to 8 ratio. The 
teacher who doubts this can easily test the matter. The 
relative extent north and south of Norway, Great Britain, 
France, and Spain can, for example, be represented by 
lines in either of the following ways : 



Norway ^ "3 

- t I 

Great Britain £ -g 



Spain 



Let the line representing the extent of Great Britain be 
taken as i. How many will see without actual measure- 
ment that Norway will then be approximately if, France 
f, and Spain f ? 



248 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 



Again the areas of continents can be represented in 
either of the following ways : 



Africa 




North America 






South Amerioa 






Europe 












Australia 






North America 



Let Europe be taken as i. How many will see without 
actual measurement that Asia will then be approximately 
4^, Africa 3, North America 2, South America if, and 
Australia f ? 

Where exact comparisons are desired extent should 
be stated in miles and areas in square miles. Where 
only rough approximations are desired there should at 
least be conscious appeals to the scale of miles in esti- 
mating extent and to some standard unit of surface in 
estimating areas. For the American pupil the most ob- 
vious unit of surface is the state in which the pupil lives. 
But if this happens to be Texas, the unit will be too large ; 
if it happens to be Rhode Island, the unit will be too 
small. In such cases some other state must be chosen. 
In any event it is necessary to have some unit and to 
realize the area of the unit. For pupils who have trav- 
eled even a little this is not difficult. For others such 
distances as have been actually experienced must be taken 



THE USE OF MAPS 249 

as the basis. At the very least the area of the community 
can be grasped. This can be compared with the area of 
the county, and the latter with the area of the state. 
The ideal arrangement would then be to have the state 
represented in every map used, and on the same scale 
as the rest of the map. Such an arrangement has been 
adopted, with France as the unit, in a number of the 
Vidal-Lablache maps. In America, with a state as a 
unit, there would need to be a set of maps for each 
state, which is, of course, scarcely practicable. Some of 
the atlases take one state as a unit and some another ; 
some of them have different states for different maps. 
The pupil is, therefore, called upon to form conceptions 
of the areas of such states as happen to be used in 
the maps placed before him. 

At best the relative areas of countries are realized 
vaguely in looking at ordinary maps in the ordinary way. 
One ingenious teacher, conscious of this condition and 
desirous of improving it for the countries of Europe, 
"made a tracing of the whole continent from the wall 
map, then he colored each of the countries with a flat 
wash, next he cut out all the countries and mounted 
Russia on a sheet of paper that just comfortably received 
it. After this he got a series of sheets of paper of the exact 
size used to mount Russia, and pasted on each of them 
one of the other countries of Europe. The amount of 



250 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

white margin in the case of small countries like Denmark 
and Belgium certainly emphasized their relative poverty 
of area." x A map of the United States cut up in the 
same way would yield new and interesting impressions 
of individual states. 

A standing source of confusion in comparing maps of 
different parts of the earth's surface is the use of different 
scales. The new Century Atlas, for example, allots a 
double page to Connecticut and Rhode Island, another 
double page to Switzerland, and another double page to 
Russia. Wall maps have one scale for Europe and 
another scale for North America. A uniform map of the 
world would greatly simplify the entire problem of map 
interpretation, and such a map is now, by international 
agreement, actually in course of construction. 

Another source of confusion is the use of different map 
projections. In the familiar Mercator projection, for 
example, the meridians are represented as parallel 
straight lines. There is thus a distortion of longitudes 
away from the equator. At latitude 60 a degree of 
longitude on the globe is only half the length of a degree 
of longitude at the equator. On a Mercator projection 
the mathematical proportions are, however, preserved 
by distortions of latitude corresponding to distortions 
of longitude, that is, by representing parallels as farther 

1 Adams, Exposition and Illustration, 362. 



THE USE OF MAPS 25 1 

and farther apart away from the equator. Greenland, 
measured in degrees on a Mercator, while thus mathe- 
matically correct, looks as big as Africa, the actual size 
of which is equivalent to about twenty Greenlands. The 
pupil should at least be made conscious that there are 
different kinds of map projections and that when any 
considerable part of the earth's surface is represented the 
relative areas of the same countries, and even their shapes, 
as seen by the eye, vary somewhat with the kind of 
projection. 1 

Ideas of mere location, of distance, of extent, or of 
area may be formed without seeing actual rivers, lakes, 
oceans, cities, or countries, and may, as already sug- 
gested, for some purposes be sufficient. Frequently, 
however, visualization is essential. The material back- 
ground is needed either to make history real or to ex- 
plain it. 

Children usually learn in the earlier stages of instruc- 
tion to think of maps in terms of their own actual geo- 
graphical environment. They are given every opportu- 
nity and inducement to apply such experience as they may 
have acquired through travel. They work at the sand 
table. They mold geographical forms in clay. They 
have placed before them models and pictures. Their 

1 For a discussion of map projection see Johnson, Mathematical 
Geography, 190-225. 



V 



252 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

earlier excursions on a map are likely, therefore, to be 
sufficiently realistic. But the problem of making maps 
real seems, in many cases, to drop out of the teacher's 
consciousness before the habit of reading maps as they are 
supposed to be read has been firmly established. In 
the upper grades, so far at least as the history lesson is 
concerned, the average pupil confronted by a map sees 
very often a map and nothing more. In the high school 
there is, as a rule, little or no instruction in geography 
and the average pupil in dealing with history continues 
very often to see in a map a map and nothing more. 
The remedy, where this condition exists, is to appeal anew 
to the pupil's own geographical environment, to his ex- 
perience in travel, to models and pictures. Teachers 
should appreciate that pupils, whether in the grades or 
in the high school, who have never seen the ocean or a 
mountain, may wander in outer darkness through ac- 
counts of matters as self-explanatory to more favored 
readers as the search for a harbor or for a mountain pass. 
Similarly dwellers by the sea or in the mountains may 
need special assistance in realizing even simple geo- 
graphical conditions different from those presented by 
their own environment. 

The relation of geographical conditions to human 
development has in recent times attracted very general 
attention and is sometimes claimed as a strictly modern 



THE USE OF MAPS 253 

discovery. "Thirty or forty years ago," said Lord Bryce 
in 1908, " it was practically an untrodden field." 1 Forty 
years earlier a writer in the Contemporary Review, in an 
account setting forth the relation, looked back another 
forty years to find the "untrodden" period. 2 Yet 
even then the idea was not entirely new. The physical 
factors in civilization, with special reference to the 
influence of climate, had been discussed by Montesquieu 
in his Spirit of the Laws, published in 1748. The general 
field of "geographic influence" had, indeed, with much 
learning and insight, been covered in the sixteenth cen- 
tury by Bodin. It was even recognized, though only 
incidentally, by some ancient thinkers, and the father 
of history was himself not unmindful of it. Its general 
recognition as a factor to be invoked in the teaching of 
history is, however, quite modern, and the treatment of 
it is still far from satisfactory. The usual plan is to 
describe the physical features of a country and to state 
in general terms their historical significance by way of 
introduction to the history of a country, and then to 
develop the history without any further reference to 
them. This falls far short of meeting the needs of the 
situation. The physical features should be brought in 

1 Report, Association of History Teachers of the Middle States and 
Maryland, 1908, p. 7. 

2 Contemporary Review, V, 29-49. 



254 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

specifically to explain specific conditions and events. 
They should be woven into the body of the narrative 
wherever they are needed and not relegated to a bare 
introduction. There should be, not merely one general 1 
physical map, but special detailed physical maps setting 
forth the special features to be realized in dealing with 
particular situations as they arise in the course of the 
narrative. 

There are other complications. Maps vary of neces- 
sity with the state of geographical knowledge. The 
ancient Greeks and Romans knew but a small part of the 
world and could, therefore, represent but a small part 
of it. The revelation of other parts to their successors 
came slowly. Great advances were made in the fifteenth 
and sixteenth centuries, but, even as late as the middle 
of the nineteenth century, multitudes of facts recorded 
on maps of to-day were still unknown. Again, many 
geographical facts are themselves subject to change. 
Names attached^ by one people to mountains, rivers, 
lakes, towns, and countries yield to other names attached 
by other peoples. Old names migrate to new localities. 
Boundaries shift with shifting political power. A 
wilderness becomes inhabited, new towns and new states 
with new names grow up. Old. towns and old states 

decay and disappear, regions once cultivated and inhab- 

i I 
ited revert to jungle or to desert. It is, then, a changing 



THE USE OF MAPS 



255 



map that is to be interpreted in the history class. The 
pupil is called upon to realize the physical world, not only 
as we now suppose it to be, but as men of other genera- 
tions supposed it to be, to identify in varying kinds of 
representation and under a variety of names this or 
that portion of the earth, to associate with this or that 
name shifting forms and areas, in a word, to view the 
map itself historically, to take account, that is, not only 
of geography, but of historical geography. 

Past geographical conditions can be represented either 
as contemporaries supposed them to be or as we now 
know them to have been. The world of Ptolemy's day, 
for example, may be set forth either on a Ptolemaic 
map or on a modern map. Contemporary maps are 
sometimes important. The plans and hopes of Colum- 
bus need for their elucidation map representations of 
the kind used by Columbus. The grants of territory 
in America secured from the Crown by English subjects 
in the seventeenth century need for their elucidation 
seventeenth century maps. History has been made by 
maps as well as recorded in maps. In the main, however, 
the purpose of maps is to represent actual geographic 
conditions. The route of Columbus, however influenced 
by fifteenth century maps, lay across an actual ocean 
and can obviously be traced only on maps that repre- 
sent the ocean as it is. The sea to sea boundaries of 



256 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Virginia, "west and northwest," however influenced 
by seventeenth century maps, can, as actually applied 
by Virginians, obviously be traced only on maps that 
represent physical North America as it really is. His- 
torical geography in school is, for the most past, con- 
cerned with changes in actual areas of political or other 
control and with changes in nomenclature relating thereto. 
For the most part, therefore, past geographic conditions 
are represented on modern maps. The outline of physi- 
cal Europe, for example, wears the same aspect for studies 
of ancient as for studies of modern Europeans. The 
differences are in the subdivisions of the map and in the 
names associated with them. The pupil is made aware 
that Austria and France were not always on the map 
of Europe and did not always present the map forms 
which they present to-day. The actual earth forms 
thus apportioned and reapportioned remain relatively 
constant and are represented as constant on the map. 
The same condition applies to the actual spatial relations 
of any other historical data included in map representa- 
tion. The trade routes of antiquity, of the Middle 
Ages, and of to-day are alike represented on modern maps. 
For the most part, therefore, the general problems of 
map interpretation are the same for past as for present 
geographic conditions. 
Thus far in the discussion it has been tactily assumed 



THE USE OF MAPS 257 

that the maps to be interpreted are ordinary wall maps 
and maps of the kind found in textbooks and atlases. 
For most of the geographical questions that arise in 
the history lesson reference to such ready-made maps, 
accompanied by proper interpretation, will be sufficient. 
But there should also be some map construction by the 
pupil. The mere copying of ready-made maps, accom- 
panied by proper interpretation, deepens impressions 
of geographic conditions. The reproduction of maps 
from memory adds still greater definiteness to map in- 
terpretation. In either case the pupil may sketch the 
map in its entirety or may merely fill in details on 
printed or blackboard outlines. 

Reproductions of maps from memory, common under 
an older regime but rather uncommon now, are not 
difficult to manage. All of the work can be done during 
the class period. As a first step the entire class may be 
sent to the blackboard and told to sketch from the text- 
book the outline, let us say, of Greece. After ten or 
fifteen minutes of this kind of work at the beginning 
of each of two or three recitations a time limit may be 
set. The class may be told to sketch the outline in five 
minutes, then in two minutes, then in one minute. As 
a second step the class may be told to draw as much of 
the outline as possible from memory and to refer to the 
textbook only so far as may be necessary. This prac- 
s 



/ 



258 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

tice may be continued until every member of the class 
can sketch the outline entirely from memory in two 
minutes or less. As further steps the various details 
desired may, in the same way, be progressively intro- 
duced until every member of the class can sketch the 
outline and fill in quickly and almost mechanically any 
details that may be required. Exercises of this kind 
admit of extension to any country and assure, at an 
average cost of four or five minutes per day, the kind of 
knowledge of geographical conditions which all teachers 
of history believe essential. Incidentally such exercises 
at the beginning of the recitation prepare for other 
matters by fixing attention upon the lesson. The 
monotony which they may at first suggest is relieved 
by varying from day to day the details to be represented 
and by the pleasure that comes from a sense of mastery. 
Similar exercises are of course possible with prepared 
outline maps. 

Some constructive work beyond mere copying or mere 
reproduction from memory is also desirable. Historical 
maps should not be left altogether in a realm of mystery 
and blind faith. Those red or blue or black lines that 
show so clearly and definitely the wanderings of bar- 
barian tribes in the fifth century, or of European explorers 
in America in the sixteenth century, should not be taken 
too seriously. The pupil should have some conscious- 



THE USE OF MAPS 259 

ness of the data from which historical maps are con- 
structed. 

A class in the high school may be asked to prepare 
a map not found in textbooks nor in the ordinary at- 
lases, a map, for example, of the territory set apart for 
his younger sons by Louis the Pious, in 817. The 
official declaration was as follows : 

"1. We will that Pippin shall have Aquitania and 
Gascony, and all the March of Toulouse, and moreover 
four counties ; namely, in Septimania Carcassone, and 
in Burgundy Autun, l'Avalonnais and Nevers. 

"2. Likewise we will that Louis shall have Bavaria 
and Carinthia, and the Bohemians, Avars, and Slavs, 
who are on the eastern side of Bavaria ; and further- 
more, two demesne towns to do service to him, in the 
county of Nortgau, Lauterburg and Ingolstadt." l 

The problem here is merely to locate the areas des- 
ignated by the names and mark them off in an appro- 
priate manner on an outline map or on a sketch made by 
the pupil. The larger divisions are easily found in an 
atlas like Shepherd's. The search for the counties 
and towns will raise questions that illustrate in a 
simple way one kind of difficulty encountered by map 
makers. 

A sixth or seventh grade working with the teacher, or a 

1 Henderson, Historical Documents of the Middle Ages, 203. 



260 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

senior class in the high school working independently, 
may be asked to trace the route of Columbus across the 
Atlantic in 1492, as recorded in his Journal. 1 In the 
following summary of the data thus supplied the numbers 
after the dates indicate the distance in leagues and the 
letters the points of the compass. 

August 3. — 15. S. ; "afterwards S.W. and W.S.W., which 
was the course for the Canaries." 

4. — "They steered S.W.jS." (Distance not 

recorded.) 

5. — 40. (Direction not recorded.) 

6. — 29. (Direction not recorded.) 

7. — 25. "On a course for the island of Lanzarote, 

one of the Canaries." 

8 to September 2. — (Direction and distance not 
recorded. Pinta repaired at Canaries.) 
"The Admiral reached Gomera on Sun- 
day the 2nd of September, with the Pinta 
repaired." 
September 6. — "He departed on that day from the port of 
Gomera in the morning, and shaped a 
course to go on his voyage. . . . There 
was a calm all that day and night, and in 
the morning he found himself between 
Gomera and Tenerif 6 ." 

7. — "The calm continued. . . ." 

8.-9. W. 

1 The text and a map of the "four voyages of Columbus" may be 
found in The Northmen, Columbus, and Cabot, Original Narratives of 
Early American History, Scribner's. 



THE USE OF MAPS 



261 



9 


— 49- 


"The sailors steered badly, letting the ship 
fall off to N.E." 


10 


— 60. 


(Direction not recorded.) 


11 


— 40. 


W. 


12 


~33- 


"Steering their course." 


13 


— 33- 


W. 


14 


— 20. 


W. 


IS 


— 27. 


W. 


16 


— 39- 


W. 


17 


— 50- 


w. 


18 


— 55- 


(Direction not recorded.) 


19 


— 25- 


" The Admiral continued on his course. . . ." 


20 


— 7 or 8. "He sailed this day toward the West a 






quarter northwest . . . because of the 






veering winds and calm that prevailed." 


21 


— 13- 


(Direction not recorded.) 


22 


— 3°- 


W.N.W. 


23 


— 22. 


N.W. 


24 


— 14. 


W. 


25 


— 4- 


W., then 17. S.W. 


26 


— 3i- 


W., "until afternoon"; then S.W., "until 
he made out that what had been said to 
be land was only clouds." 


27 


— 24. 


W. 


28 


— 14. 


W. 


29 


— 24. 


w. 


3° 


— 14. 


w. 


October 1 


— 25. 


w. 


2 


— 39- 


w. 


3 


— 47- 


w. 


4 


-63. 


w. 


5- 


— 57- 


"The Admiral steered his course." 



6. 


— 40. 


7- 


— 23- 


8. 


12. 


9- 


— 5- 


o. 


— 59- 


i. 


— 27. 



262 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

W. 

W., then 5. W.S.W. 

w.s.w. 

S.W., then 4. W. by N. "Altogether in day 
and night, they made 1 1 leagues by day 
and 205 leagues by night." 

W.S.W. 

W.S.W., then 22. "At two hours after mid- 
night the land was sighted at a distance 
of two leagues." 1 

The problem here is to note the distance and direction 
of each day's sailing and lay off to scale the entire course 
from August 3 to the morning of October 12. For 
effective blackboard work there should be about 8 feet of 
space. One inch may then be taken to represent 12 
leagues. The pupils should have their textbook maps 
of the voyage before them, and also a ready-made wall 
map or chart of the voyage. Where the text of the 
Journal is accessible, the chief incidents of the voyage 
may be located and added to the blackboard sketch 
at the points at which they are recorded. 

Such an exercise will illustrate another kind of diffi- 
culty in the making of historical maps. The pupil 
will see that the usual map representation of the route 
does not follow exactly the record in the Journal and 
that the gaps in the record seem to have been bridged 

1 The Northmen, Columbus, and Cabot, Original Narratives, 91-110. 



THE USE OF MAPS 263 

by inference. Both conditions will suggest questions 
and comments, and the result of the exercise should 
be a more intelligent view of the map of the great 
voyage. 

Again, a seventh grade working with the teacher, or a 
senior class in the high school working independently, 
may be asked to prepare a map of the territory granted 
to the London and Plymouth Companies by the charter 
of 1606. For a seventh grade the essential portions of 
the charter should be read to the class very slowly and 
discussed step by step. 

James, by the grace of God, King of England, Scotland, 
France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, etc. Whereas our 
loving and well disposed Subjects [eight mentioned by name], and 
divers others of our loving Subjects, have been humble Suitors 
unto us, that We would vouchsafe unto them our Licence, to make 
Habitation, Plantation, and to deduce a colony of sundry of our 
People into that part of America commonly called Virginia, and 
other parts and Territories in America, either appertaining unto 
us, or which are not now actually possessed by any Christian 
Prince or People, situate, lying, and being all along the Sea Coasts, 
between four and thirty Degrees of Northerly Latitude from the 
Equinoctial Line, and five and forty Degrees of the same Latitude, 
and in the main Land between the same four and thirty and five 
and forty Degrees, and the Islands thereunto adjacent, or within 
one hundred Miles of the Coast thereof ; 

What was "that part of America commonly called 
Virginia"? Recall the origin of the name. What was 



264 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the grant to Raleigh? His charter, granted by Eliza- 
beth in 1584, gave him "free libertie and licence from 
time to time, and at all times forever hereafter, to dis- 
cover, search, finde out, and view such remote, heathen, 
and barbarous lands, countries, and territories, not 
actually possessed by any Christian Prince, nor inhabited 
by Christian People, as to him . . . shall seem good, and 
the same to have, holde, occupie and enjoy. . . ." How 
did Raleigh know that this meant America? What 
lands were "viewed" for him or by him? What lands 
were occupied? These questions will bring out the 
vagueness from which Virginia is now about to emerge. 
Returning to the extract from the charter of 1606, 
what lands were at that time possessed by Christian 
princes or peoples? What is meant by "Equinoctial 
Line"? Find "four and thirty Degrees of Northerly 
latitude" on the sea coast; "five and forty degrees." 
Draw lines on the blackboard to represent the parallels 
of 34 and 45 . Mark the points where the sea coast 
would be. Sketch the general trend of the coast line 
between these parallels. Draw a line at sea one hundred 
miles from the coast. 1 How much of the land can thus 
far be definitely located ? The preamble continues : 

1 Time is saved when the teacher makes the blackboard sketch. 
But the exercise is more effective when the drawing is done by the 



THE USE OF MAPS 265 

And to that End, and for the more speedy Accomplishment 
of their said intended Plantation and Habitation there, are desir- 
ous to divide themselves into two several Colonies and Companies, 
the one consisting of certain Knights, Gentlemen, Merchants, and 
other Adventurers, of our City of London and elsewhere, which 
are, and from time to time shall be, joined unto them. . . . And 
the other consisting of sundry Knights, Gentlemen, Merchants, 
and other Adventurers, of our Cities of Bristol and Exeter, and 
of our town of Plimouth, and of other places, which do join them- 
selves unto that Colony. . . . 

Ask some pupil to describe in his own words the ar- 
rangement here proposed. Why were two "Colonies 
and Companies" desired? The word " Adventurers " 
is used in a sense unlikely to be familiar to children. 
Have a member of the class find it in the dictionary 
and explain it. A few other words may need similar 
treatment. Before passing to the next paragraph go 
back to "James, by the Grace of God, King," and read 
the entire preamble as cited. Ask the class for a sum- 
mary. Then read : 

"We greatly commending, and graciously accepting of, their 
Desires . . . do, therefore. . . . Grant and agree, that the said 
. . . Adventurers of and for our City of London, and all such 
others, as are, or shall be, joined unto them of that Colony, shall 
be called the first Colony; And they shall and may begin their 
said first Plantation and Habitation, at any Place upon the said 
Coast of Virginia or America, where they shall think fit and con- 
venient, between the said four and thirty and one and forty 
Degrees of the said Latitude. . . ." 



266 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Has any land thus far been granted? What is 
granted? Be sure that this is clear. Add to the black- 
board sketch a line to represent the parallel of 41 . 

And we do likewise . . . Grant and agree, that . . . [the 
others] of the town of Plimouth ... or elsewhere . . . shall be 
called the second Colony; And that they shall, and may begin 
their said Plantation and Habitation, at any Place upon the said 
coast of Virginia and America, where they shall think fit and con- 
venient, between eight and thirty Degrees of the said Latitude, 
and five and forty Degrees of the same Latitude. . . . 

Is any land here granted to the " second Colony?" 
What is granted? Be sure that this is clear. Add to 
the blackboard sketch a line to represent the parallel 
of 3 8°. The class will now be prepared to understand 
the further specifications of the charter. The provision 
for each of the two colonies was : 

. . . They shall have all the Lands, Woods, Soil, Grounds, 
Havens, Ports, Rivers, Mines, Minerals, Marshes, Waters, Fish- 
ings, Commodities, and Hereditaments, whatsoever, from the said 
first Seat of their Plantation and Habitation by the Space of fifty 
Miles of English Statute Measure, all along the said Coast of Vir- 
ginia and America, towards the West and Southwest, as the Coast 
lyeth, with all the Islands within one hundred Miles directly over 
against the same Sea Coast; And also all the Lands, Soil, [etc.] . . . 
from the said Place of their first Plantation and Habitation for 
the space of fifty like English Miles, all alongst the said Coasts of 
Virginia and America, towards the East and Northeast, or towards 
the North, as the Coast lyeth, together with all the Islands within 



THE USE OF MAPS 267 

one hundred Miles, directly over against the said Sea Coast ; 
And also all the Lands, Woods, [etc.] . . . from the same fifty Miles 
every way on the Sea Coast, directly into the main Land by the 
Space of one hundred like English Miles. 1 

Provided always, and our Will and Pleasure herein is, that 
the Plantation and Habitation of such of the said Colonies, as 
shall last plant themselves, as aforesaid, shall not be made within 
one hundred like English Miles of the other of them, that first 
began to make their Plantation, as aforesaid. 2 

Where was the first "Plantation" of the first colony? 
Block out on the blackboard its land grant. Where was 
the first "Plantation" of the second colony? Block 
out its land grant. Suppose the first colony had first 
settled in latitude 39 , could the second colony have settled 
in latitude 40 ? in latitude 38 ? Why? What does 
the textbook mean by the London and Plymouth Com- 
panies? The study may conclude with a comparison 
between the blackboard sketch and the map in the text- 
book or with the wall map. In either case glaring dis- 
crepancies are likely to appear, for there are few topics 
in colonial history that have been treated more care- 
lessly than the boundary provisions of the charter of 
1606. 

With a senior class in the high school the material 

1 This is the description of the grant to the first colony. It is repeated 
with slight changes in phraseology for the second colony. 
2 Poore, Charters and Constitutions, Part II, 1888-1890. 



268 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

may be placed in the hands of the pupils to be worked 
out without the guiding questions of the teacher. 1 

x The materials for studies of this type in American history are 
abundant and easily secured. See American History Leaflets, Nos. 6, 
16, 22, and 32. See also Gannett, Boundaries of the United States, Bulle- 
tin No. 226, United States Geological Survey. Gannett supplies ma- 
terials for studies relating to the boundaries of the United States as a 
whole and also to the boundaries of each of the states. The bulletin 
can be purchased for thirty cents from the Superintendent of Documents, 
Washington, D.C. 



CHAPTER XI 

Textbooks in History 

From the point of view of American conditions the 
most important aid in the teaching of history is the text- 
book. It is, indeed, more than an aid. In the majority 
of American schools it determines the facts to be taught 
and the manner of teaching them. A teacher called 
upon to instruct any grade above the third is almost 
certain to demand a textbook for use by the children. 
From this point on to the end of the high school course 
the study of history, in most of our schools, means at 
bottom the preparation of textbook lessons, and the 
teaching of history means at bottom the discussion of 
textbook lessons. In Europe the textbook is less im- 
portant. Historical instruction in the elementary school 
is almost entirely oral, and even in the secondary school 
formal textbook lessons are comparatively rare. 

Textbooks have sometimes shaped and sometimes 
followed the ideas of makers of history programs. In 
either aspect their history is so closely related to pro- 
grams in history that the general character of the facts 
provided by textbooks can be read in the general char- 
269 



, 



U& 



270 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

acter of the programs. All of the theories of history 
examined in earlier chapters of the present work have 
produced their crops of textbooks. Facts and arrange- 
ments of facts have, therefore, varied widely. The 
teacher in search of a textbook will naturally be guided, 
in the first instance, by the theory that seems to him 
most conclusive. Beyond this there is, however, a use- 
ful classification based upon the degree of fulness with 
which facts are treated. Three general types are dis- 
tinguishable : 

1. Books that aim to present a bare skeleton or framework of 
facts, sometimes little more than an outline or syllabus. They 
are called in Germany Leitfaden and in France precis. 

2. Books that develop the outline into a fuller reading story, 
and yet frankly leave room for further development. They may 
conveniently be designated by the French term manuels. 

3. Books that aim to be self-sufficient, to treat each topic so 
fully as to make it intelligible without further development. 
They may conveniently be designated by the French term cours. 1 

Each type of textbook is to be judged by the purpose 
for which it is intended. It is scarcely fair to complain 
of a book frankly designed to be a manuel, that it is too 
condensed and too dry and that teachers who use it 
must supplement the material either by oral instruction 
or by collateral reading. Nor is it fair to complain of a 

1 For the use of these terms in France, see L'Enseignement Secondaire, 
February 15, 1909, p. 63. 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 27 1 

book frankly designed to be a cours, that it is too full of 
details, that it leaves little for the teacher to do except 
to hear lessons, and that it weakens the incentive to 
collateral reading. These are considerations to be de- 
cided before the textbook is selected. In the United 
States, however, relatively few writers appear to have 
been definitely conscious of such differences in treatment. 
Most of our books are of the manuel type. Writers of 
some of them have consciously aimed to leave some- 
thing for the teacher to do in the way of expounding the 
book and of adding outside readings. But so many have 
been guided by the belief that brevity is synonymous 
with simplicity, and so many teachers share this belief, 
that our textbooks must in general be viewed primarily 
as instruments for lesson-getting and lesson-reciting. 

Textbooks for the intermediate grades often do 
achieve both brevity and simplicity. But in such cases 
the writer usually feels relieved of any responsibility 
for a complete story, or even for a continuous story. 
Simplicity is secured by the elimination of topics that 
cannot in brief space be treated concretely. The stories 
actually included are, for the most part, stories that 
cannot be told at all without being told concretely. 
Such classics as the story of Captain John Smith and 
Pocahontas and the story of George Washington and 
his hatchet are reasonably safe in the hands of any 



272 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

writer likely to obtain a hearing from publishers of 
books for children or in the hands of any teacher likely 
to be tolerated in the schoolroom. 

The teaching of history in the upper grades presents 
conditions much more difficult to meet. Here the 
subject is usually American history, and tradition 
demands of the textbook writer the whole story. 
Furthermore, tradition limits the size of the textbook. 
Not only must the whole story be told ; it must be told 
in some four hundred odd pages. The usual mode of 
meeting the condition is to enlarge on topics that are 
inherently simple and interesting, and to simplify others 
by not saying much about them. A story like that of 
the Pilgrims and the settlement of Plymouth may thus 
occupy three or four pages, and may even descend to 
details. A story like that of the founding of the Massa- 
chusetts Bay Colony may be reduced to a short par- 
agraph of generalities. The net result for the average 
book is that it is only in part intelligible. 

In a grammar school book by a competent and dis- 
tinguished historian New England is introduced as 
follows : 

The Puritans. — The New England colonies were founded by 
English Puritans who left England because they could not do as 
they wished in the home land. All Puritans were agreed in wish- 
ing for a freer government than they had in England under the 
Stuart kings and in state matters were really the Liberals of their 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 273 

time. In religious matters, however, they were not all of one 
mind. Some of them wished to make only a few changes in the 
Church. These were called Non-Conformists. Others wished to 
make so many changes in religion that they could not stay in 
the English State Church. These were called Separatists. The 
settlers of Plymouth were Separatists ; the settlers of Boston and 
neighboring towns were Non-Conformists. 

The pupils are thus prepared for the story of the 
Pilgrims to which the author devotes about three and 
one-half pages. His next topic is "The Founding of 
Massachusetts, 1629-1630." Of this he writes : 

Unlike the poor and humble Pilgrims were the founders of 
Massachusetts. They were men of wealth and social position, as, 
for instance, John Winthrop and Sir Richard Saltonstall. They 
left comfortable homes in England to found a Puritan state in 
America. They got a great tract of land extending from the 
Merrimac to the Charles, and westward across the continent. 
Hundreds of colonists came over in the years 1629-1630. They 
settled Boston, Salem, and neighboring towns. In the next ten 
years thousands more joined them. From the beginning Massa- 
chusetts was strong and prosperous. Among so many people 
there were some who did not get on happily with the rulers of the 
colony. 

The words are simple. Children even in a sixth 
grade can read them and give them back in the class 
recitation. The routine teacher, content to rest the 
matter there, will get the impression that the book is 
admirable, and perhaps write a testimonial for the pub- 
lishers. The teacher accustomed "thoroughly to ex- 



274 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

pound the text" may find it a convenient summary. 
Teachers of the latter type are, however, in the minority. 
Routine results will be those most in evidence. Thought- 
ful observers, perceiving these, will ask if the children 
see or feel anything except words. Do they see any 
Puritans? Do they see anything that the Puritans 
might change or any reason for changing it? Do they 
see anything that happened in America? What are 
Stuart kings and liberals in state matters to those who 
never heard of either before? What are comfortable 
homes, wealth, and social position? One thing to 
children in the crowded tenements of lower New York, 
another thing to children in the mansions on Fifth 
Avenue, and still another to children at the cross-roads 
where "comfortable board and lodging" may be had 
for eight dollars per month. But what do the words 
actually tell about the circumstances of the Puritans? 
What is gained in the narrative by naming John Win- 
throp and Sir Richard Saltonstall, when nothing further 
is said about either of them? Is it a distinguishing 
characteristic of Puritans that they "left England because 
they could not do as they wished in the home land ?" or 
that "in religious matters they were not all of one 
mind?" or that "among so many people there were 
some who did not get on happily with the rulers of the 
colony?" Do these statements, individually or collec- 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 275 

tively, differentiate the Puritans from people who are 
leaving even the United States to-day because they can- 
not do as they wish, who in religious matters are not 
all of the same mind, and who do not get on with the 
rulers, here or elsewhere? 

In a grammar school book by a well-known "popu- 
larizer" of American history we read : 

The Puritans. — Bitter religious persecution prevailed in 
England at that time. Many thought the Church of England so 
corrupt that they withdrew from it. They were called Separatists 
or Independents, while those who aimed at reform within the 
church were called Puritans. 

The story of the Pilgrims is then told in about four 
pages. This brings the author to the Massachusetts 
Bay Colony. 

The Massachusetts Bay Colony was formed of Puritans, some 
of them wealthy, and all of high character. They made a settle- 
ment in 1628 near Salem. Boston was founded two years later by 
Governor Winthrop, and between the years 1630 and 1640 twenty 
thousand people settled in Massachusetts. The various colonies 
scattered throughout the province all seemed to be on the road to 
prosperity. 

Even professional educators have been known to 
attack the situation without improving it. A super- 
intendent of city schools, who evidently felt the need of 
a little more background in the treatment of Puritans 
and Separatists, has inserted between a six-line para- 



_- 



276 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

graph, headed, "The Plymouth Company," and a 
fifteen-line paragraph, headed, "What is a Puritan? 
a Separatist? a Pilgrim?" — the following: 

Religious Awakening of the Sixteenth Century. — If the times 
are propitious, any reform, as it proceeds, gathers strength from 
causes without, as well as within, itself. Luther's protest in 1517 
became a great religious awakening, and in time changed the 
established lines of religious thought. Its success was enhanced 
by the fact that an awakening was also in progress in educational, 
scientific, and all other lines of thought. In England the move- 
ment resulted in the establishment of the Church of England, 
whose ritual retained much of the formal method of worship used 
by the Catholic Church. 

The old-fashioned general history for the high school 
was constructed under similar limitations. An author 
was allowed one hundred fifty or two hundred more 
pages, but this expansion was scarcely proportionate 
to the expansion of the subject. With the same dread 
of leaving something out, there would of necessity be 
less chance in a general history than in a history of the 
United States of finding space for something to be put in. 
The introduction of the "block" system of the Com- 
mittee of Seven relieved the condition in part and made 
a fuller treatment possible. Paragraphs were extended 
to pages, pages were extended to chapters. There are 
now in each of the four fields marked out by the Commit- 
tee of Seven books that approach the cours type. The 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 277 

feeling of responsibility for all the facts consecrated by 
school tradition is, however, still in evidence. Much 
has been added, but comparatively little has been elim- 
inated. Some books on ancient history and some on 
mediaeval and modern history are almost as summary in 
treatment as the older books on general history. There 
are still both writers and teachers who seem to estimate 
the difficulty of a topic by the amount of reading matter 
apportioned to it, and who would, therefore, favor a 
summary treatment even if other conditions did not 
make it appear inevitable. 

A textbook, whatever its scope and whatever the 
stage of instruction for which it is intended, should at 
least aim at definiteness and some degree of concrete- 
ness. Because a book is brief it does not follow that 
it must be vague. Definiteness and concreteness are 
attainable without adding greatly to the number of 
words. It is possible in any case to mix a few partic- 
ulars with the necessary generalities, to seek specific 
rather than resounding adjectives, to add to superla- 
tives and figures of speech some measurable data for 
comparison. 

Under the topic, "Periods of Egyptian History," 
in a book intended for the first year of the high school, 
and highly commended for the purpose by many teachers, 
we read : 



278 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

During the time of the old empire the most important dynasty 
was the fourth, when the great pyramids and the sphinx were 
built at Gizeh, and the vast necropolis, or rock cemetery, was laid 
out at Sakkarah, near Memphis. 

Five pages farther on we meet the topic, "Egyptian 
Architecture and Monuments." 

The religious spirit of the Egyptians was strongly impressed 
upon their architecture, which consisted mainly of tombs and 
temples. The buildings for the dead are seen in the rock-sepul- 
chers cut in the sides of the hills which flanked the Nile — for 
example, the extensive necropolis at Sakkarah (near Memphis). 
Separate monumental tombs took the form of pyramids, and 
reached the most gigantic proportions at Gizeh. In these artificial 
mountains of stone rested the remains of kings. 

"Vast necropolis," "gigantic proportions," and "arti- 
ficial mountains of stone" — these are good phrases, but 
do they achieve definiteness ? For answer let us turn to a 
treatment of the same subject in a book for beginners 
in the study of ancient history in the French lycee. 

.The Egyptian kings took pride in building enormous monu- 
ments, especially temples for the gods and tombs for themselves. 
For three thousand years men went on building in Egypt tombs 
and temples. Many are still standing and excite the wonder of 
travelers. 

The oldest and most celebrated of these monuments are three 
famous pyramids which are the tombs of three kings. 

They stand in lower Egypt (some leagues from Cairo), upon a 
plateau which served as a cemetery, for it is everywhere strewn 
with monuments and little pyramids, each of which is a tomb. 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 279 

These pyramids seem at first to be only enormous masses of 
stone, no opening is visible. They were once encased in blocks 
of polished stone, so smooth that they could not be scaled, and so 
well fitted together that a hair could not have been inserted 
between any two blocks. But when this covering was pierced a 
series of small chambers, united by narrow galleries, was disclosed. 
It was in one of these chambers that the king was buried. The 
coffin of one of the kings was found ; the coffins of two other kings 
had disappeared, — the tombs had been violated. It was to avoid 
profanations of this kind that the builders had so carefully con- 
cealed the entrance to the vaults. 

The fine polished stones which formed the covering of 
the pyramids have been torn away and the masonry has been 
exposed to view. The great pyramid has thus been reduced in 
height more than seven meters. It now measures not more than 
137 meters instead of its former 144 ; it is still one of the highest 
monuments in the world. 

Not far from the pyramids, an enormous head of stone lifts 
its form from the sand. It is the Sphinx, image of the god Har- 
makhis, who represented the rising sun. The rest of the body is 
to-day buried in the sand, but excavation has revealed its form. 
It is the body of a crouching lion cut in the rock. The monument 
is 19 meters high, that is, the height of a five-story building; the 
ear measures a meter. l 

The test of definiteness and concreteness is, under 
American conditions, the first step to be taken in the 
examination of a textbook, and the most important, 
for it determines in general the answer to the ever 
present question, "Does the book lend itself to lesson- 

1 Seignobos, UAntiquite, 16-17. 



u MjtM 




280 TEACHING OF HISTORY 



getting?" There are, however, other important ques- 
tions to be asked. Is the book accurate? What is its 
special point of view? What is the character of the 
pictures, maps, and other aids to visualization? Are 
the references for collateral reading suitable? Are the 
questions, outlines, digests, and other pedagogical aids, 
if it contains any, helpful? Is there a good table of 
contents? Is there a full index? Does it offer a good 
model of English? Is it interesting? 

The initial test of accuracy is the author. Who is he 
and what has he done ? Under an earlier regime almost 
anybody who could write at all could write a text- 
book on almost any subject. A single author might, 
without apology to the proprieties, place to his credit 
textbooks in half a dozen different fields and then, 
perhaps, round out his career by compiling a dictionary. 
So far as history is concerned, authors without histor- 
ical training may still venture to make contributions, 
but among their competitors are now to be found pro- 
fessional students of history, and amateur effort is now 
largely confined to the elementary field. Most of the 
recent high school books in history have come from the 
hands of experts. This raises a presumption of accuracy. 
It should be remembered, however, that the profes- 
sional student is usually a specialist. He has his period 
or his subject. When he assumes responsibility for the 



^1 rf-Vu^ V Pa4*Jm, 

TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 28 1 

larger field of a textbook, he is forced to become, in 
part, a compiler and must be judged, to some extent, as 
a compiler. It was a distinguished historian out of his 
field who, in the first edition of a well-known textbook 
in American history, transposed the political platforms 
of the Davis and Douglas democrats of i860. It was 
another distinguished historian out of his field who, in 
another well-known textbook in American history, 
confused the Reconstruction Act of 1867 with quite a 
different measure. Fortunately for the teacher, text- 
books by experts are usually reviewed by experts, and 
palpable errors are likely to be pointed out. But there 
should be some independent tests by the teacher. 

An author's point of view is sometimes set forth clearly 
in his preface or introduction and sometimes left to be 
inferred from the kinds of facts selected, from the 
manner in which they are interpreted, and the distri- 
bution of emphasis. Books produced in different coun- 
tries differ widely in point of view. A national bias 
is often boldly proclaimed. Indeed, comparisons be- 
tween textbooks of different countries yield at times 
almost startling illustrations of the subjectivity of 
history. There is apparently one Europe for the Aus- 
trian textbook, one for the Prussian, one for the French, 
and one for the American, each with its own peculiar 
hues. Taking the United States alone, we get per- 



282 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ceptibly different pictures of certain conditions and 
events in passing from a book by a New Englander to 
a book by a Pennsylvanian and then on to a book by a 
Virginian. A teacher should at least notice differences 
in point of view as expressed in the general proportions 
of a book. Is it an ancient history? How much 
space is devoted to the Peloponnesian War ? to the post- 
Alexandrian period? to social conditions? to art ques- 
tions? Does the author enlarge on the period of the 
Roman Republic or on the period of the Empire ? Pages 
alone, of course, do not necessarily indicate the relative 
importance attached to topics. From a recent study of 
the fame of Euripides as compared with the fame of 
Sophocles, it appears that Euripides gets the greater 
space in the histories, but Sophocles gets the adjectives 
and is therefore judged the more famous. A textbook 
writer may show his emphasis by his adjectives. Pages 
are none the less a rough test. A teacher desiring 
to enlarge on the nineteenth century will scarcely 
select a textbook on mediaeval and modern European 
history which devotes five-si xths of its space to t he 
period before the French Revolution. A teacher who 
thinks the thousand years before the nineteenth century 
important will scarcely select a textbook half of which 
is devoted to the nineteenth century. Of two books 
equal in other respects teachers will, in view of present 






TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 283 

emphasis, naturally give preference to the book which 
offers the more adequate treatment of industrial and 
social conditions. 

Pictures, maps, and_.Qthex -visual aids suggest their 
own speciaTquestions. What is the principle of selec- 
tion? Is there a definite relation between the text and 
the illustrations ? Are the latter clear and well printed ? 
Does the author indicate the sources of his maps and 
pictures? Are the maps accurate? Do the pictures 
represent realities or fanciful conceptions of reality? 
Purely imaginative illustration is still common in ele- 
mentary books and is not wholly absent from high school 
books. Maps are still often bad. Some of them con- 
tain too much detail, some of them are not clear, some 
of them are quite inaccurate. It would be a decided 
gain if all authors could be prevailed upon to indicate 
the sources of their pictures and maps. This would 
in itself be likely to invite more careful selection and 
greater attention to details. In the absence of such 
information it is often difficult for a teacher to estimate 
the historical value of the illustrative materials in a book. 

American textbooks, almost without exception, now 
contain references for collateral reading. The teacher 
will naturally examine their general character and ar- 
rangement. Are the references general or specific? 
Do they indicate titles only or chapters and pages? 



284 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Are they classified? Is the pupil made conscious of the 
kind of material to which he is referred? Are there 
references to other textbooks? to historical novels and 
poems? Are the works mentioned likely to be in an 
average library? A textbook is not always the safe 
guide to collateral reading that it ought to be. Often 
the only test applied seems to be that of relevance to the 
subject under discussion. 

The average table of contents contains merely titles 
of chapters. Some authors, however, include a complete 
analysis of the book. Some indexes are perfunctory, 
indefinite, and incomplete. Others are full and specific. 
To teachers who make no use of either tables of contents 
or indexes, these are considerations of no special signifi- 
cance. To others they suggest pertinent tests. 

The pedagogical aids, when present, are sometimes 
helpful and sometimes a sheer waste of space. They 
are sometimes so bad that pupils must be warned not to 
use them. The tests to be applied will depend upon the 
type of lesson which the teacher proposes to assign and 
the type of recitation to be followed. 

Textbooks, as a rule, lack literary distinction. They 
cannot seriously claim to be works of literature. We 
have a right to demand grammatical English, clearness 
and definiteness of statement, and a connected story. 
We have also a right to demand that a book shall be 



TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY • 285 

interesting. It is well, however, to analyze the nature 
of the interest. One way to make a book interesting 
is to parade the personal opinions of the author. If 
he praises and blames somewhat extravagantly, if he 
speculates somewhat daringly on what might have 
happened if something else had not happened, if he 
adopts now and then a flippant tone, if he makes of 
historical characters his personal friends and enemies, 
he is almost certain to be entertaining to young readers. 
Another way to make a book interesting is to enlarge 
on sensational episodes, to introduce backstairs gossip, 
to quote from speeches and state papers what is spicy 
rather than what is important. Interest may be at- 
tained at too great a cost. A book to be eminently 
respectable need not be eminently dull, but no eminently 
respectable work of textbook scope can at all points be 
interesting to all readers. 



CHAPTER XII 

The Use of Textbooks 

Historical instruction in the lowest grades of the 
elementary school is necessarily oral. The teacher either 
reads or tells the story or develops it by a combination 
of reading or telling and questioning. As soon, however, 
as children are themselves able to read, the tendency in 
the United States is to pass from oral to book instruction. 
In schools that have history throughout the eight years 
of the elementary course there is usually a transition 
period during which history stories are treated simply as 
reading material. This period varies in length. The as- 
signment of lessons for formal study and recitation may 
begin as early as the fourth grade. It may be deferred 
until the sixth or seventh grade. In schools that defer his- 
torical instruction of any kind until the sixth or seventh 
grade the instruction is commonly from the very begin- 
ning textbook instruction. Throughout the high school, 
textbook lessons are almost everywhere the rule. How to 
use a textbook is, therefore, to most teachers, the fun- 
damental problem of historical instruction, and, to many 
of them, there is reason to fear, the whole problem. 
286 



u 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 287 

The learning and reciting of textbook lessons is often 
called in Europe the American method of teaching his- 
tory. Textbooks are as common and of as many varie- 
ties in Europe as in the United States, and have from 
the beginning had a place in school instruction in his- 
tory. The facts which they contain are more thoroughly 
learned in Europe than in the United States. But 
formal textbook lessons are usually neither assigned nor 
recited. The instruction, regardless of the nature of the 
textbook, is in general oral. In the lower classes the 
teacher talks and questions. The pupils, as soon as 
they are able, take notes. The general method em- 
ployed is sometimes the developmental and sometimes 
N the purely informatory. In the first case the teacher 

v supplies fundamental data and then, by a course of 

questioning, leads the pupils to make comparisons with 

other known data, to draw inferences, and to build 

up such new facts as the data may warrant. The lesson 

is cooperative. This method has been applied most 

conspicuously in Germany. In the second case the 

teacher does practically all of the building and the aim 

of the questioning is, in the main, to make sure that 

the pupils are following and understanding the facts. 

This method has been applied most conspicuously in 

France. In either case pupils understand in a general 

way that the textbook is useful as an aid in keeping 



288 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

their bearings, and that their textbook readings are 
to follow class discussions. Here and there the text- 
book plays a more prominent part. Here and there 
lessons are definitely assigned and recited. But the 
practice is viewed with disfavor by the majority of 
European teachers. In Belgium it has been pro- 
nounced the worst of pedagogical heresies. 1 Even the 
French, who have carried the principle of making the 
textbook self-explanatory farther than any other people, 
maintain in general the tradition of oral instruction. 

In the upper classes the teacher talks more and ques- 
tions less. Sometimes he talks and does not question 
at all. This is true at times even in the lower classes. 
Oral instruction thus reverts to its ancestral type, the 
lecture system, at one time widely prevalent in all 
grades of historical instruction. In France, for example, 
before the adoption of the program of 1902, it was rare, 
above the lowest lycee classes, to hear a pupil's voice in 
the classroom. The teacher talked during the entire 
class period ; the pupils took notes and afterward read 
the textbook. While the present regulations forbid 
formal lecturing and direct the teacher to question 
his classes, there are still those long in the service who 
find it difficult to change established habits, and who 
go on lecturing in the old way. The younger teachers 

1 Ministere de VInterieur et de VInstruction publique, 1905, p. 16. 



o ^^ 



XlCA (*6*\ 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 289 

are, however, thoroughly imbued with the new spirit 
and yield to the lecture temptation no oftener than 
teachers in other countries. 

The European method of oral instruction, with what- 
ever may be left of the lecture system, makes the place 
of the textbook entirely clear. The textbook is not 
the starting point. If of the precis type, it is merely a 
summary of facts after they have been more fully pre- 
sented or developed by the teacher. If of the cours 
type, it may be an elaboration of facts already presented 
or developed by the teacher. When later the pupil is 
questioned in class, he is questioned, as a rule, on the 
facts and not on the textbook, ^he teacher teaches; 
the textbook summarizes or elaborates, refreshes the 
memory, fixes names and dates, and in general helps 
the pupil to keep his bearingsii 

To the old-fashioned teacher of American tradition 
the place of the textbook was equally clear. His duty 
as a teacher began with the assignment of a certain 
number of paragraphs or pages and ended with the " hear- 
ing" of the lesson. "After the battle the king went 
— John, you may go on." After John had gone on for 
some minutes he was relieved by "next," who in his 
turn was relieved by "next," and so on to the end of the 
lesson. The ideal was to reproduce the exact words 
of the textbook, and it was at first mainly as a concession 



290 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

to weaklings that the pupil was allowed to sum up in his 
own words the substance. The concession was, however, 
made and in time proved fatal to the system. First 
came the discovery that the pupil who could gather 
up the facts of the textbook and set them forth in his 
own words deserved more credit than his competitor 
of facile verbal memory, and then the discovery that 
questions, at first also regarded in part as a concession 
to weaklings, might stimulate useful comparisons and 
inferences. The memoriter system did not entirely pass 
away. It is even yet neither wholly extinct nor wholly 
without respectable defenders. Among its beneficiaries 
are some now in the evening of life and some just out of 
college who are ready to testify that the history which 
has remained with them, the history which they have 
drawn upon when they have thought of history at all, 
has been the history in the textbook committed to 
memory in some fitting school and not the history which 
they afterward studied in college. Such results are 
not altogether bad and, to the extent that they have 
ceased to be attained under other systems, one can 
sympathize with those sturdy opponents of change who 
saw in each new step a lowering of the standards of 
instruction. The worst that can be said of the memori- 
ter system is in some respects not worse than the worst 
that can be said of some other systems. If in the one 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 20 1 

case the pupil learns "nothing but facts," except that 
incidentally he learns also very often to hate history, 
in other cases he may learn not even " facts" and still 
learn incidentally to hate history. But changes were 
inevitable, partly because with the spread of historical 
instruction the number of weaklings unable to memorize 
increased alarmingly, and partly because the judicious, 
as soon as they began to ask the meaning of study, saw 
in the operation of the old system no necessary analysis 
of the textbook, no opportunity for exercises in the 
selection and organization of material, and, often, no 
need of even understanding the book. 

The textbook viewed as material for something more 
than memorizing presents a more complicated problem. 
The use to be made of it depends first of all upon the 
kind of textbook. Is it of the precis type? Then 
surely no teacher ought to think of assigning lessons 
in advance and of spending the time in class having 
the lesson recited. If such a book is to be studied at all, 
each new lesson should either be worked over by the 
teacher at the time of making the assignment or be 
filled out by required readings in other books. Below 
the seventh grade the ability of the average pupil to 
comprehend is so far in advance of his ability to read 
that the necessary details are most economically and 
most effectively supplied by the teacher. The text- 



u Im**™~+***i ty^* 



292 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

book may be read with the class and treated as a guiding 
thread in the unfolding of a fuller story, or it may be 
brought in only at the close of the story, and treated as a 
summary. In either case the pupil's own study of the 
textbook should follow, and not precede, the fuller 
story. After the story has been developed, after the 
children have repeated it, after they know what it is all 
' about, they may be sent to the textbook, as in Europe, 
M to find out where they are in the general scheme of things, 
l u to fix names and dates, to see how one topic is related to 
another, and to obtain further hints of what they ought 
to remember. Beginning with the seventh grade 
required readings outside of the text may to an ever 
increasing extent be substituted for contributions by 
the teacher, and the pupil may be left, more and more, to 
his own devices in passing from the textbook outline 
to the fuller account and back again to the textbook. 
"The Puritans left England because they could not do 
as they wished in the home land." This tells the pupil 
practically nothing. It does perhaps suggest that he 
ought to know what it was the Puritans wished to do in 
the home land and could not do. In any event, after he 
has found out what they wished to do, the statement 
tells him so much that it may be worth remembering. 
The textbook as a whole may on this principle be 
worth remembering. But the textbook is not the lesson. 



j THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 293 

*ilt is only a guide to a larger fund of knowledge and a 
summary of such knowledge after it has been acquired. 
The bare summary type of textbook, taken for what 
it is, has certain advantages. In the lower grades the 
supplementary oral instruction needed to make the book 
intelligible may raise the level of the history course. 
One reason why American estimates of the ability of 
children to cope with history are lower than similar 
European estimates is the American habit of translating 
history so largely into the reading vocabulary of children. 
In the upper grades, and in the high school, the summary 
leaves more time for collateral reading than a fuller text- 
book. There are teachers who turn these advantages to 
(p excellent account and who would feel themselves ham- 
pered by a fuller textbook treatment. But there are 
others to whom a textbook is a textbook and a class 
recitation a recitation of the textbook. The pupil who 
remembers that "the Puritans left England because 
they could not do as they wished in the home land," is, 
in many a schoolroom, commended and pressed no 
further. The history lesson thus degenerates into an 
exercise in mere words. Teachers in the lower grades 
of the elementary school, without training in the art 
of oral instruction and without some special knowledge 
of history, and teachers in the upper grades or in the 
high school, without a good school library, will be on 



294 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

safer ground if they avoid the bare summary type and 
seek on principle a fuller treatment. 

With a book of the cours type, a book, that is, which is 
definite in statement and reasonably complete in neces- 
sary details, a book which pupils can really understand, 
there is at least a partial justification for assigning mere 
textbook lessons and for spending the time in class hav- 
ing them recited and applied. Much depends upon the 
manner of learning the lessons and the manner of reciting 
them. In some schools lessons in history are taken as 
seriously and studied as intelligently before coming to 
class as lessons in Latin or in mathematics. In other 
schools the assignment is little more than a fiction. 
The pupils have trained the teacher to do most of the 
reciting. In still other schools the schedule allows little 
or no time for outside preparation. The teacher has the 
class for the class period to do what can be done. Some 
teachers approve of this plan, either because their 
experience in trying to persuade pupils to study a history 
lesson has been unhappy, or because they believe that 
better results can be secured under the teacher's im- 
mediate direction than through independent study. 
The character of the class recitation must, it is clear, 
vary with the character of the preparation. 

LThe chief difficulty with mere textbook lessons of the 
odern type is that the pupils, very often, have not been 






jj^-Q^i^ J^^H 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 295 

taught how to studyl The teacher assigns as of old 
pages 88-95 or paragraphs 65-74. The pupils read the 
lesson five or six times, ten times, even twenty times, if 
their own reports are to be credited, without learning 
what the lesson is really about. This condition, where it 
exists, is so sadly apparent that any teacher might be 
expected to discover it and to realize the plain duty 
which it suggests. The fact remains that many teachers 
do not discover it. It is a good rule, therefore, for all 
teachers to begin the year's work or the term's work with 
some preliminary tests of the ability of pupils to find 
their way in the textbook. Let one pupil read aloud a 
paragraph from the textbook, the others following with 
books open. Ask the reader to tell in his own words 
what he has read. Ask others to criticise and to fill 
out. Have the paragraph read a second time and ask 
again to have its substance reproduced. Continue the 
process until some definite results are secured and note 
carefully the changing character of the summaries made 
by the pupils. A single class period spent in this way 
may revolutionize a teacher's ideas of lesson-getting. 
One senior class in a high school after three readings, 
with books open, found some difficulty in reproducing 
the substance of the following paragraph : 

Early Geographical Ideas. — The idea that the earth was 
spherical in shape, and not flat, as had been taught in the Homeric 



296 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

poems, was held by many learned men among the ancients. For 
instance, Aristotle, a Greek philosopher who lived in the fourth 
century before the birth of Christ, had proved to his own satis- 
faction, by observations made during eclipses and in other ways, 
that the earth was round. This theory had been held by men 
who lived before Aristotle; but the idea seems to have been re- 
garded as novel when he wrote. A most remarkable statement 
was made on the subject by another Greek writer, Eratosthenes, 
who lived in the third century before Christ. His works are lost, 
but according to Strabo, a Roman geographer (b.c. 40-A.D. 60), 
he wrote: "If the extent of the Atlantic Ocean were not an 
obstacle, we might easily pass by sea from Iberia to India, still 
keeping the same parallel, the remaining portion of which occupies 
more than a third of the whole circle. But it is quite possible 
that in the temperate zone there may be two or even more habit- 
able earths." 

When, after the first reading, the teacher asked for a 
summary the class did not understand what was re- 
quired. "We don't do our history that way," com- 
plained one. "Ask us some question," demanded 
another. In the end the teacher had to ask questions, 
had, that is, to assist the class in analyzing the para- 
graph. Would any teacher, after such an experience, 
be likely to go on with page assignments in the text- 
book, or in other books, and leave the pupils, without 
further instruction,, to do the rest? 

The condition may be met in one of two ways : (1) by 
indicating definitely what the pupil is to look for, or 
(2) by teaching him to read the textbook so intelli- 



4^0^-^ t <***~«L 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 297 

gently that he may himself find what he ought to look 
for. The former is by far the simpler procedure and is 
the one commonly followed by teachers alive to the needs 
of pupils. 

Textbooks themselves often provide guidance ques- 
tions. A book for the elementary school, for example, 
introduces a chapter on "French Pioneers" as follows: 



The Fisheries and the French. The first sailors to come 
from France to the New World were Breton and Norman fisher- 
men. The abundance of codfish on the banks of Newfoundland 
had been noticed and reported by John Cabot in 1497, and fishing 
vessels from various countries soon found their way thither. 
The oldest French name in America, that of Cape Breton, is 
probably as old as 1504; and ships from Normandy and Brittany 
have kept up their fishing in those waters from that day to this. 
Ships from Portugal and Biscay came also, but at first not many 
from England, for the English were used to catching their cod- 
fish in the waters about Iceland. Gradually, however, the Eng- 
lish came more and more to Newfoundland, and by the end of 
the sixteenth century the fisheries were practically monopolized 
by French and English. 

During that century the fisheries were almost the only link 
between France and the coast of North America. In 1518, Baron 
de Lery tried to found a colony on Sable Island, but was glad to 
get away before starving to death. Francis I., who became king 
of France in 1515, laughed at the kings of Spain and Portugal for 
presuming to monopolize between themselves all new discoveries 
east and west. Had Father Adam made them his sole heirs? 
If so, they had better publish the will ! . . . 



298 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

At the end of the chapter are "topics and questions." 
Those relating to the matter just quoted are : 

The Fisheries and the French. 

1. What brought French sailors to the New World? 

2. Why were there so few Englishmen at first on the Newfound- 
land banks ? 

3. What did the king of France think of Spanish and Por- 
tuguese claims to all new lands? 

In addition to such questions, textbooks often con- 
tain "suggestive questions and directions." The book 
quoted above has the following on the Newfoundland 
fisheries : 

Where are the banks of Newfoundland? What fish are 
caught there? Why should fish be so abundant there? How 
extensive are the banks? From what countries do fishermen go 
there? Who own these banks? Do fish in the ocean belong to 
any person or country in particular ? Do fish in harbors, rivers, 
brooks, and inland waters belong to people in such a way as to 
make it wrong for other people to catch them ? Have the banks 
of Newfoundland had anything to do with history? If so, tell in 
what way. Find on some map the places from which the fisher- 
men mentioned in the text used to come to the banks. 

With aids of this character and the further aids 
supplied by paragraph headings and marginal topics a 
pupil may reasonably be expected to make some prog- 
ress, if his attention is called to such aids and if he is 
definitely instructed to use them in preparing his lesson. 
If the questions are not considered suitable, others may 



Q^jJsC^ c^cu^O, 






THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 299 

be substituted by the teacher. In either case the ques- 
tions may constitute the substance of the lesson assign- 
ment. 

An aid of a somewhat different character is supplied 
by the ready-made outline, which, like questions, may be 
provided either by the textbook or by the teacher. 
Outlines are of two general kinds : (1) those that convey 
information, and (2) those that merely suggest what the 
pupil is to look for. Both are analytical, both are de- 
signed to show what is most significant and to furnish a 
convenient exhibit of relations. An information outline 
may introduce the American Revolution as follows : 

I. Conflicting views of the British Constitution. 

A . The colonial view. 

1. Union^through the crown. 

2. Representation in colonial legislatures. 

B. The British view. 

1. Union through parliament. 

2. Parliament supreme throughout the British Empire. 

A guidance outline may introduce the same subject as 
follows : 

I. Nature of the British Constitution. 

1. The colonial view. 

2. The British view. 
II. Changes in British policy. 

1. The British debt. 

2. The trade acts. 

3. The army. 






300 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

A ready-made outline of the information type that 
sums up clearly the essentials of a history course may 
with profit be thoroughly memorized. According to a 
committee of the New England History ^Teachers' 
Association such an outline not only may but must be 
memorized. It "must be the Alpha and Omega of every 
new topic ; it must be indelibly engraved upon the mind 
of the student, must be written and rewritten, said back- 
wards and forwards. . . . Around this core is built up 
the student's knowledge. About it he groups what he 
remembers of books, sources, and classroom talk." 1 A 
guidance outline scarcely invites this kind of memorizing. 

Lessons based upon a ready-made outline are naturally 
assigned in terms of the outline. The topics are named, 
or their numbers, and the pupils understand that they 
are to fill in from their textbook. In this way provision 
is easily made for the omission of any topics in the text- 
book not considered essential, and for collateral reading. 
The pupil knows what to look for, knows where he is 
while he is looking for it, and knows its relation to the 
general scheme. The class recitation is also in terms of 
the outline. It can be carried on either by announcing 
topics from the outline or by asking questions based 
upon the outline. 

Some critics of textbook lessons seem inclined to 

1 Publication No. i, New England History Teachers' Association, 14. 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 3OI 

exclude any formal analysis and recitation of the text, 
or even of collateral reading, and to confine attention to 
the solution of problems. "Read the next ten pages in 
the text; also one of the following references. . . . 
Bring in a map, drawn by yourself, showing the loca- 
tion of the two armies at this time." To this form of 
lesson assignment there are, it has been urged, three very 
serious objections. In the first place, the textbook is 
not "suitable to all without an analysis of individual 
cases. It has been used to a very large extent just in 
this way. But it consists of a logical arrangement 
of subject matter, excellent for reading reference, but 
not necessarily suited either to individual students or 
to individual lesson units." In the second place, the 
effect upon the teacher is demoralizing. "Real teach- 
ing rapidly deteriorates under such conditions. If there 
is one influence tending to make teaching mechanical 
and empty, it is found in the assignment given as a mere 
task rather than for the purpose of working out an 
important problem." In the third place, the influence 
upon the attitude of the pupil is unwholesome. The 
pupil "too frequently feels that such as assignment is 
only an arbitrary task in the daily grind of school work. 
Why should the facts related in these ten pages be 
learned ? . . . With such questions in mind, how small 
the inspiration to study vigorously !" 



302 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

How, then, should a lesson be assigned? According 
to the critic who has just been quoted, the ground should 
first be broken by "real class study." This accom- 
plished, the pupil should be sent away to solve some 
definite problem and not to cover a certain number of 
pages. Taking the Albany Congress as an example, 
the following is, after preliminary class study of the 
topic, suggested as a proper assignment : 

i. Find further evidence that the colonists were in need of 
a closer union. 

2. Arrange this evidence in the form of a convincing argument. 

3. Support the text by at least one good illustration of efforts 
to secure a closer union in some phase of present life. 

4. Read pages 112-116 and 120-126 in the text for informa- 
tion as to the attitude of the colonists immediately following the 
Albany Congress. (This is in anticipation of "class study" at the 
next meeting of the class.) x 

What is here proposed is still at bottom to assist the 
pupil in finding his way through the textbook. The 
"logical arrangement of subject matter" found in the 
textbook is "not necessarily suited either to individual 
students or to individual lesson units." This is the 
underlying assumption. The position taken is, however, 
supported by two other assumptions: (1) that "a mere 
task" in school is reprehensible, and (2) that "an 
arbitrary task in the daily grind" is converted into 

1 School Review, Vol. 18, pp. 627-633. 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 3O3 

something to which that stigma does not attach by the 
simple expedient of telling the pupil somewhat defi- 
nitely what he is to look for and to think about. 

Whether a textbook is "excellent for reference read- 
ing," or for anything else, depends, as has already been 
pointed out, upon the kind of textbook. Textbooks 
themselves cannot be put into one generic class and 
judged "without an analysis of individual cases." It 
is at best somewhat hazardous to place a form of assign- 
ment under the ban because it seems to impose a task. 
Even granting, for the moment, that a "mere task" 
is indefensible, has the task idea been altogether elimi- 
nated by the problems suggested? May not the pupil, 
with reason, still ask to have the ways of the teacher justi- 
fied? Why should further evidence be found that "the 
colonists were in need of a closer union ? " Of what con- 
sequence to the pupil is it to "arrange this evidence in the 
form of a convincing argument ? " Why should he "read 
pages 1 1 2-1 1 6 and 120-126 in the text for information 
as to the attitude of the colonists immediately follow- 
ing the Albany Congress?" Are not pupils sensitive 
to "tasks" likely to detect them even in such problems? 

Questions, outlines, and problems have in common 
the merit of giving the pupil something definite to look 
for and to think about in the preparation of the history 
lesson. They do beyond doubt simplify the learning 



304 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

of lessons. But if this is an end necessary and desirable 
in itself, there is perhaps justification for thinking that 
more can be accomplished by giving still more assistance. 
For those who entertain such an opinion there is a plan 
widely followed in the French lycees that is worthy of 
attention. 

The professor introduces a new topic by dictating a 
brief summary which the pupils enter verbatim in their 
notebooks. The summary indicates clearly and defi- 
nitely the high points of the topic. As soon as it has been 
copied the notebooks are laid aside and the professor, 
rising from his chair, proceeds to expliquer the summary. 
He puts in the details, he elaborates the ideas, he il- 
lustrates, he explains, he makes the whole situation real. 
He is always clear, often entertaining, and sometimes 
eloquent. Having completed his explication, he sits 
down again. The pupils return to their notebooks and 
take another summary, which is followed by another 
explication. Two or three summaries and two or three 
explications are ordinarily given during an average class 
period. The first part of the next period is taken 
up with questioning. Each pupil as he is called upon 
steps up to the side of the professor's desk, hands in his 
notebook, and then faces the class. The professor asks 
questions, and, while the pupil is answering, examines the 
notebook. The design is to test first the memory and 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 305 

then the understanding. The latter receives special 
emphasis. The professor spends most of the time trying 
to find out if the pupil really knows what he is talking 
about. The pupil is not allowed to escape with vague 
statements. He too must be clear and definite, he too 
must expliquer. A French professor is constantly say- 
ing to his class by his manner, by his questions, and 
by his criticism : "Messieurs, il faut preciser vos idees." 
Not more than two or three pupils are likely to be called 
forward during a class period, but the recitation at its 
best keeps the whole class alert and often calls forth 
brief discussion from the floor. 

Whatever the plan evolved for assisting the pupil, 
the general American theory of personal initiative and 
personal independence would seem to suggest as one test 
of effectiveness the ability of the pupil eventually to 
find his way alone. The textbook is, after all, a book, 
and the ability to read a book is of greater importance 
than a predigested knowledge of its contents or the 
solution of predetermined problems. Whether any one 
of the plans thus far examined for piloting the pupil 
through his textbook trains him to be his own pilot 
later may well be doubted. The tendency, once the 
habit is established of assisting the pupil step by step 
to analyze, to select, and to organize the material in a 
textbook, is to go on giving the same kind of assistance 
x 



306 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

to the end of the school course. What may then be 
expected is illustrated by the experience of the senior 
class mentioned above. This class may have been ex- 
ceptionally stupid, but behind the apparent inefficiency 
lay six or seven years of successful historical study based 
upon ready-made outlines and guiding questions. More- 
over, experiments with other classes accustomed to such 
outlines and questions have, at stages ranging from the 
sixth grade up through the high school, revealed a 
similar state of inefficiency. Nor is it wholly without 
significance that even in college the all-directing outline 
is rather generally regarded by students" as^aiTTnalien- 
able right and by instructors as an indispensable condi- 
tio^ oLma^ig^a^courseJntelligible. 

In any event training for independent study through 
practice in studying independently may, with textbooks 
in themselves intelligible, begin when the use of a text- 
book begins and continue throughout the course. There 
are in general three modes of procedure. 

i. The pupil is sent to the textbook without pre- 
liminary directions or suggestions. He reads the lesson. 
On coming to class he is questioned on his reading. 
"What brought French sailors to the New World? 
Why were there so few Englishmen at first on the 
Newfoundland banks? What did the king of France 
think of Spanish and Portuguese claims to all new 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 307 

lands?" The quejtion^gjidzajiswer method, that is, 
does for the pupil, after he has read the lesson, what 
guiding questions, ready-made outlines, or problems 
do for him while he is reading the lesson. The results 
are in appearance often good. The pupil is able to 
answer the questions. The plan- does afford opportunity 
for independent study. It can, however, scarcely be 
said to encourage independent study. With guiding 
questions to lean upon in class, few pupils are likely to 
be stimulated to do more than to read the lesson, and 
often the first lesson is read as intelligently as the hun- 
dredth lesson. Q4s+4*jL<t&U*«L 

2. The pupil is required to analyze the lesson and to 
bring to class a written outline. In the recitation one 
pupil is asked to copy his outline on the board. Other 
pupils criticise step by step, ask questions, and make 
suggestions. The teacher asks other questions and adds 
criticism and suggestions. The aim is to discover the 
best selection of particulars, the best words or phrases 
for indicating their nature, the best grouping of partic- 
ulars, the best names for the groups, the best combina- 
tions of smaller into larger groups, the best names for 
the larger groups, and so on to a complete exhibit in 
outline of the lesson. The outline built up on this 
cooperative plan and agreed upon as best is entered by 
all pupils in their notebooks and made the basis of later 



308 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

consideration of the lesson. The results are often ad- 
mirable so far as the analysis of the lesson is concerned. 
The pupil learns how to discover on his own initiative 
what is really significant and why. The difficulty is to 
find time in class for discussions of anything except 
outlines. Some teachers meet the difficulty by omitting 
discussions of outlines as outlines and by requiring 
pupils to make them merely for their own guidance in 

reciting. <k»JLju* \JU ViaaAJL b^^O U^ 

3. The pupil is taught in preliminary practice lessons, 
worked out in class under the immediate guidance of 
the teacher, how to study and how to learn a lesson. 
With books open at a passage like that on the fisheries 
and the French, quoted above, a practice exercise for a 
seventh grade may assume the form indicated by such 
directions and questions as the following : 

Notice the heading of the paragraph. Read to your- 
selves the paragraph. Does the heading really tell 
you what the paragraph is about ? Read the paragraph 
again and find all the different things that are men- 
tioned. Name in three or four words each of these 
things and enter in your notebooks. How many of them 
would you expect to find mentioned under the heading, 
" The Fisheries and the French ? " Pick out all the things 
that you would not expect to find mentioned under this 
heading. Put them together and think of the kind of 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 309 

heading under which you would expect to find them 
mentioned. What is the subject of the chapter ? What 
things in the paragraph are directly connected with 
this subject? What have the other things to do with 
this subject ? Are they necessary to give an idea of this 
subject? What things are necessary? What things, 
then, are most important for this subject? least im- 
portant? The pupil, that is, analyzes the paragraph, 
names its separate parts, looks for relations, considers 
what is important from the point of view of these re- 
lations, selects and classifies the material. When his 
work is complete, he has before him an outline of the 
paragraph. From this outline he sums up in his own 
words the paragraph, and then, laying aside the outline, 
sums up again the paragraph. Analyzing in the same 
way the next paragraph, he relates the material to what 
has gone before and again summarizes, first with the 
outline before him, and then with the outline laid aside, 
and so on to the end of the lesson. With the outline 
of the lesson as a whole before him he sums up in his 
own words the whole lesson and then, laying aside the 
outline, sums up again the whole lesson. In this way 
emphasis is laid, not upon the outline itself, but upon the 
use to which it is put. The test of value is the connected 
account which the pupil is able to give of the paragraph 
or the lesson. 



3IO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

An average class will in the course of eight or ten 
practice lessons of this type learn how to apply the plan 
without directions and without questions, and the 
recitation may then resolve itself in part into a mere 
"hearing" of the lesson. The teacher announces a 
topic and, after a brief pause to give the class a start in 
thinking about it, calls upon A. The floor now belongs 
wholly to A. All the time there is is his, and he is free to 
develop the topic in his own way without interruptions 
of any kind. After A has made his contribution other 
members of the class offer criticism or ask questions. 
If the ground has not been satisfactorily covered, it is 
covered a second time by B, and then perhaps a third 
time by C. Then comes the teacher's turn. The pupils 
are questioned to make sure that they understand what 
they have been discussing. If they do not, the teacher 
guides them in further consideration of the topic and, 
when necessary, adds explanations. All this is for 
the purpose of bringing the data clearly before the 
class. The next step is to lead the pupils to make 
comparisons with other known data, to recognize differ- 
ences and resemblances, to draw inferences, and to trace 
relations. 

The ideal of this type of lesson is to make the pupil 
so intelligent in his use of a textbook that he may, by 
a single reading, and without the formality of writing 



QAjGa 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 31I 



out an outline, learn what he ought to learn. The 
ideal recitation for such a lesson is one in which the 
data furnished by the textbook are disposed of in 
fifteen or twenty minutes, so that the remainder of 
the period can be devoted to elaboration and to appli- 
cations of the data, with the emphasis upon the 
applications. 

There are other ways of dealing with the textbook. 
The pupil may, with or without specific guidance, pre- 
pare lessons and not recite them. The class period may 
in such cases be devoted wholly to discussions that either 
supplement the information provided by the text or 
turn that information to account in making comparisons, 
in reasoning from cause to effect, in building up generali- 
zations. Or no outside preparation may be required. 
The time in class may be spent in reading the textbook, 
in making outlines or digests, or in summarizing in some 
other way essentials. The teacher may make running 
comments and ask questions designed to make the pupil 
think about his reading, with or without imposing upon 
him the burden of remembering anything. Or, with 
books open and the class merely skimming the pages, 
the teacher may talk about the "big things," with here 
and there a question to stimulate thought. 

Some teachers believe that more than one textbook 
should be used. This was proposed by the Madison 



312 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Conference. "We recommend," said the Conference, 
"that a practice be established in the schools of using 
two, three, or four parallel textbooks at a time. By 
preparing in different books, or by using more than one 
book on a lesson, pupils will acquire the habit of com- 
parison and the no less important habit of doubting 
whether any one book covers the ground." * The cus- 
tom of using more than one book can be dated far back 
of the Madison Conference. It had, however, been as- 
sociated with communities in which pupils were in 
the habit of bringing such textbooks as the family 
happened to possess, and teachers had singularly over- 
looked such advantages as were suggested by the Con- 
ference. "If," wrote Horace Mann in 1837, "eight or 
ten scholars . . . have eight or ten different books, as 
has sometimes happened, instead of one recitation for all, 
there must be eight or ten recitations. Thus the teacher's 
time is crumbled into dust and dissipated. Put a ques- 
tion to a class of ten scholars, and wait a moment for 
each one to prepare an answer in his own mind, and 
then name the one to give the answer, and there are ten 
mental operations going on simultaneously; and each 
one of the ten scholars will profit more by this social rec- 
itation than he would by a solitary one of the same 
length. But if there must be ten recitations instead of 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, 189. 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 313 

one, the teacher is, as it were, divided by ten, and re- 
duced to the tenth part of a teacher. Nine- tenths of 
his usefulness is destroyed." 1 There are still teachers 
in backward communities who are struggling with the 
difficulty described by Horace Mann and who see the 
difficulty much as he saw it. That some teachers de- 
liberately create the condition and reap advantages from 
it is not to be denied. But in general the time required 
for the learning of more than one textbook would bring 
more valuable results if devoted to collateral reading in 
works other than textbooks. 

In any form of lesson-reciting an important place 
must be assigned to questioning. Questions should, 
first of all, be clear, definite, and concise. They should 
be so phrased as to be intelligible without repetition or 
reconstruction. Classes learn in time to know what a 
teacher means by awkwardly framed or ambiguous 
questions, but often the answers returned ought not 
logically to be forthcoming. Pupils answer because 
they guess, in spite of the question, what the teacher 
wants. This is bad both for the teacher and for the pupil. 
It would be better for both if there were more pupils 
like the boy in the story from Ohio. Said the teacher, 
"You know what I want you to say, Johnnie ; why don't 
you say it?" "I know what you want all right," 

1 Report to Massachusetts Board of Education, 1837, p. 34. 



314 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

responded Johnnie, "but you ain't asked the question 
what fetches it." x 

Questions are of two general kinds : those that call 
for facts, and those that call for the use of facts. Under 
the former are included all questions answered directly 
in the textbook. Under the latter are included all 
questions that require independent selection, grouping, 
comparison, inference, and application. Questions of 
the first kind are memory questions. Questions of the 
second kind are thought questions. Questions of either 
kind may assume a variety of general forms. They may 
be questions that can be answered by yes or no. Did 
Pitt sympathize with the colonies in 1774? Did Pitt 
have anything to do with bringing on the American 
Revolution? They may be alternative questions. Did 
Franklin look with favor or disfavor upon the Stamp 
Act? Was Franklin's attitude toward the Stamp Act 
wise or unwise? They may be leading questions. To 
stop smuggling in the colonies the English government 
resorted to what kinds of writs? What reasons had 
Hancock as a prominent Boston merchant for his opposi- 
tion to English policy ? They may name a subject or 
indicate a line of thought and leave the pupil to develop 
it. What were the causes of the American Revolution? 
Why was George Washington chosen commander-in- 

1 Stevens, The Question as a Measure of Efficiency in Instruction, 4. 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 315 

chief? They may, as in the examples cited earlier in 
this chapter, analyze a topic. 

Questions that can be answered by yes or no and al- 
ternative questions should not be too sweepingly con- 
demned. They can be so phrased as to exercise both 
memory and the powers of reflection. Their chief use 
is, however, to place the pupil on record, to establish a 
point of departure for criticism of some previous state- 
ment or for further development. Leading questions 
are most frequently employed in the developmental 
type of lesson, and here often convey the impression that 
the pupil is building up knowledge which is really being 
built up for him by the teacher. Such a procedure is 
scarcely to be justified. But the leading question has 
its uses. It may, like yes or no questions, serve the pur- 
pose of getting the pupil on record for further discussion. 
It may occasionally lead in the wrong direction for the 
purpose of testing the intellectual wariness of a pupil. 
In the main, however, teachers should ask questions that 
name subjects or indicate lines of thought and, when 
necessary, questions that guide analysis. 

Questions that name subjects frequently involve a 
waste of words. Discuss Pericles, tell what you know 
about Pericles, what can you say of Pericles? what do 
you know about Pericles ? — these are awkward, and in 
some respects objectionable, ways of announcing the 



316 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

topic Pericles. A high school boy was asked what he 
knew about Alexander the Great. "Alexander," he 
answered, "rode a fast horse in his youth and died 
drunk." "You get a zero for that," remarked the 
teacher grimly. "But I did what you asked me," 
insisted the boy, " I told you what I know." The simple 
topic, Alexander the Great, might have elicited the same 
answer, but the teacher would have had better ground 
for the zero. 

Questions, whatever their form, should deal with 
manageable units. A teacher in a recent lesson asked a 
pupil in the first year of the high school, "What influence 
have the literature and philosophy of ancient Athens 
had on our own literature?" Another teacher asked a 
pupil in the third year of the high school to "compare the 
labor laws of Elizabeth with the labor laws of our own 
country or state." The climax was, perhaps, attained 
by still another teacher who asked a pupil in a sixth 
grade to "compare the civilization of Athens with the 
civilization of the United States ! " Such questions, 
unless specifically raised and discussed in the textbook 
or previously summarized in class, are, of course, im- 
possible. Comparison should begin with specific acts or 
specific beliefs of particular men, or with specific condi- 
tions or specific events. Later on, one historical char- 
acter may be compared with another historical character, 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 317 

one war with another war, one political compaign with 
another political campaign, one industry with another 
industry. 

"Teachers," says Miss Stevens, "are rarely at a loss 
for questions — in fact it seems that the first considera- 
tion with many is ability to ask them rapidly. The 
situation as I have found it since I have been making a 
study of the subject makes me appreciate the attitude 
of the youthful teacher of history, who said with assur- 
ance upon accepting her first position, ' Oh, I'm going to 
ask questions so fast that the pupils will have no chance 
to think of anything.'" 1 This ideal seems often to be 
actually realized in practice. In the recitations in history 
observed by Miss Stevens, the number of questions asked 
during a forty-five minute period ranged from 41 to 142 ; 
that is, from about one per minute to about three per 
minute. 2 Such a pace is obviously fatal to any real 
thinking and can mean little more than the testing of 
the memory. 

There is a place for rapid-fire memory questions. They 
are useful for purposes of drill and review. They are 
fair and proper tests of the reaction time of the pupil. 
But most teachers agree, in theory at least, that the 
emphasis should be laid upon questions that stimulate 
thought. 

1 Stevens, The Question as a Measure of Efficiency in Instruction, 2. 

2 Ibid., 11-15. 



318 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Recitations of any type may be either oral or writ- 
ten. Most American schools have too little rather 
than too much written work. But for the difficulty 
of finding time to read papers it would be a wise 
rule to have some written work in every recitation. 
That difficulty cannot be wholly overcome. Yet most 
of the papers can be made brief. There can be a daily 
exercise of not more than five minutes on some question 
announced at the opening of the recitation, a weekly 
exercise of fifteen minutes on a single question, or on a 
series of questions requiring brief answers, and occasional 
exercises occupying the entire class period. Many of 
these papers can be exchanged and marked in class, 
the teacher giving the answers and the pupils giving 
the marks. Pupils, moreover, receive training in writing, 
whether all of the papers are read or not. A teacher 
responsible for one hundred pupils in the high school 
cannot be expected to read one hundred papers a day. 
He can read ten of the hundred. He can select parts 
of the ten for discussion in class and thus reach most of 
the conditions that call for criticism or commendation. 

It would be idle to propose any one solution of the 
textbook problem as the best for all possible cases. 
That may be left to enthusiasts who believe in panaceas. 
But the self-activity of the pupil holds so large a place 
in American discussions of education that the plan of 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 319 

teaching the pupil to study the textbook independently 
and to sum up in class, without the assistance of guiding 
questions, what he has learned, merits some special 
consideration. 

It may be objected that the plan is impossible, that 
it puts too great a strain upon the pupil, or that it de- 
stroys interest. To this there is the general answer 
that the plan can at the cost of a little time be tested 
in any school. Teachers who fear loss of interest do 
not take sufficient account of the pleasure that comes 
with a sense of mastery. To give the pupil a sense of 
mastery is, indeed, one of the secrets of making history 
interesting. No one can feel much enthusiasm in dis- 
cussing what he does not know or even in applying what 
he does not know to the solution of problems. The 
analysis of a lesson, it may be added, offers in itself a 
very respectable problem. 

It may be objected that the learning and reciting 
feature of the plan is simply a return to the dark ages of 
history teaching. But this is to ignore fundamental dis- 
tinctions in the manner of preparing lessons, in the 
purpose of testing for results, and in the place assigned 
to such results in the general scheme of recitation. The 
learning and reciting constitute only a part of the 
lesson. The other and more important part consists of 
turning what has been learned from the textbook to use. 



320 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

It may be objected that the very responsibility placed 
upon the pupil in giving him free rein to develop in his 
own way a topic is a standing invitation to inattention 
on the part of the class. The possibility of inattention 
must be admitted, but it is not peculiar to this type of 
recitation. Some of the least attentive of all classes are 
those constantly under the fire of "short, sharp ques- 
tions." The evil is in many cases aggravated by the 
habit of making the recitation an affair between the 
teacher and the individual pupil who happens to be 
reciting. "Tell me," says the teacher, "about Alex- 
ander the Great." "Tell me what the Spartans did 
after the battle of Thermopylae." "Tell me where was 
opposition to Julius Caesar." Some teachers of excep- 
tionally strong and attractive personality may find this 
introduction of a "pleasing personal element" effective. 
The majority will do well to encourage an entirely 
different attitude toward the lesson. Say to the pupil : 
"You are not telling this to me. You are telling it to 
the class. Think of it as something which no one here 
has ever heard of before. Tell it in such a way that a 
person who had actually never heard of it before would 
understand all about it. Tell it so well that we shall 
all be interested. It is quite possible in this way to 
give the pupil a different conception of his own contri- 
bution, to make him feel that if he does not hold the 



THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 32 1 

attention of the class the fault is his and not the teacher's, 
to place him consciously in the position of the sensi- 
tive preacher or lecturer who finds his audience going 
to sleep. Experiment has shown that attention often 
follows if only as a matter of courtesy and reciprocity. 
John listens to Charles and James, knowing that when 
his turn comes, Charles and James will listen to him. 

The real difficulty is not so much lack of attention on 
the part of the class as lack of self-restraint and patience 
on the part of the teacher. There are those to whom 
the mere thought of thirty seconds of silence in the class- 
room is intolerable. If the pupil hesitates an instant 
he is lost. There are others to whom a mispronounced 
word, a slip in grammar, a wrong name, or a wrong date 
is the signal for immediate interference. The reaction 
time of the slow pupil should of course be quickened. 
Errors should of course be corrected. Every pupil has 
a right to know whether he has done well or ill. It is 
tenderness altogether misplaced to let any pupil off with 
half statements or with statements only half true. The 
habit of some teachers of pronouncing everything "very 
good," or of correcting a pupil so gently that he does 
not know that he has been corrected, is to be deplored. 
It may not be altogether wise to indicate to a pupil his 
exact rank in the class. A French teacher one day 
said to a pupil, "You are the grandson of our premier 

Y 



322 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

but you are the last in your class," and the pupil readily 
admitted the fact. Another French teacher openly re- 
marked to a visitor, "Our best pupil is absent to-day," 
and the class all nodded approvingly. This is the other 
extreme, but it is on the whole preferable to leaving a 
pupil entirely comfortable when, for his intellectual sal- 
vation, he ought to be uncomfortable. Criticism is to 
be encouraged and not discouraged. Contributions by 
the teacher are to be encouraged and not discouraged. 
But the slow and the quick, the erring and the letter 
perfect, are alike entitled to their day in court before 
sentence is passed or the recitation taken out of their 
hands. If the pupil is to do his part, he must have a 
fair chance, and if he is to have a fair chance, the teacher 
must cultivate the golden but neglected art of knowing 
when to keep still. 



CHAPTER XIII 

The Selection and Management of Collateral 
Reading 

While the textbook is in the United States the chief 
instrument of school instruction in history, a convic- 
tion has developed, especially during the last twenty 
years, that the textbook should be supplemented by 
collateral reading. The need of reference books was 
strongly emphasized by the Madison Conference. 
"Recitations alone," it was declared, "cannot possibly 
make up proper teaching of history. It is absolutely 
necessary, from the earliest to the last grades, that there 
should be parallel reading of some kind." 1 Some 
progress in meeting this condition had been made 
before 1892. Information collected by the Conference 
seemed to indicate that about one-fifth of the grammar 
schools reporting, and about one-half of the high schools 
and academies, required some work outside of the text- 
book. But this work seems to have been viewed, even 
by some teachers who required it, as desirable rather 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, 192. 
323 



324 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

than as "absolutely necessary." "The main necessity," 
urged the conference, "is that teachers should have it 
firmly fixed in their minds that it is as impossible to 
teach history without reference books, as it is to teach 
chemistry without glass and rubber tubing." 1 

"The main necessity," so far as the high schools were 
concerned, appears to have been met with promptness 
and energy. The Committee of Seven in 1899 found little 
difference of opinion "on the question of supplementing 
the textbooks with additional reading of some sort." 
"Only one principal known to the Committee" advo- 
cated "the extensive use of the textbook with little or 
no additional work." Between theory and practice 
there was, however, a considerable gulf. "It is sur- 
prising," observed the Committee, "to find how few 
schools really seem fitted out with good collections of 
standard secondary writers, suitable either for reading 
or for written work." In view of the lack of material 
it was less surprising to find that three-fourths of the 
schools reporting had no specified requirement of col- 
lateral reading, and that pupils were apparently left to 
browse without any system of enforcing readings. 
From the replies received the Committee drew the con- 
servative inference that the schools had not as yet 
"fully introduced the system of collateral reading," 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, 193. 



COLLATERAL READING 325 

and that many of them did not have the necessary 
library. 1 

The last fifteen years have brought material gains. 
Many schools now have good libraries and make good 
use of them. But the comments of the Committee of 
Seven on the situation in 1899 are still to a large extent 
applicable. Much of the work assigned is still wholly 
optional. There is still a conspicuous absence of any 
general system of specified requirements. There is still, 
in many cases, a lack of the necessary library. 

The difficulty has been in part one of finding time for 
work outside of the textbook, and in part one of secur- 
ing funds for the purchase of books. It has, perhaps, 
in larger part been a lack of definiteness in principles of 
grading, in the statement of aims, and in methods of 
selecting and managing library material. Numerous 
lists of very definite references have been compiled. 
Examples may be found in books on the teaching of 
history, in courses of study, in special guides to his- 
torical material, and in ordinary textbooks. There are 
lists that modestly confine work outside of the textbook 
mainly to readings in other textbooks, lists that refer 
almost exclusively to material prepared expressly for 
supplementary reading, lists that place the chief em- 
phasis upon historical fiction and poetry, lists that refer 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 144, 145. 



326 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

for the most part to standard secondary works and 
standard primary sources, and lists that include, with- 
out fear or favor, references to textbooks, to simplified 
supplementary material, to fiction and poetry, and to 
standard secondary works and standard sources. Ap- 
parently no taste nor interest nor stage of intelligence nor 
financial condition has been neglected. But relatively 
few of these lists suggest on analysis any high degree 
of discrimination in the selection of materials or make 
clear the special ends to be served and how to serve 
them. 

What, for example, is to be expected from readings 
in other textbooks ? The materials' Jiave the merit of 
being inexpensive and easy to obtain. They may to a 
slight extent impress upon pupils the fact that not all 
of history is in any one book. They may to a slight 
extent illustrate differences in point of view, and occa- 
sionally call attention to discrepancies in fact. But as 
a plan for supplementing in any real sense the class 
textbook they approach the climax of futility. What 
is to be expected of simplified supplementary material? 
Here again the material is inexpensive and easy to 
obtain. Some of it is excellent, both as reading and as 
history. Much of it is, however, like the ordinary 
textbook, put together on the familiar principle of 
making a long chapter simple by reducing it to a short 



COLLATERAL READING 327 

paragraph. Much of it suffers from the further dis- 
advantage of being quite unhistorical. 

References to other textbooks and to simplified sup- 
plementary material recognize at least that there is a 
problem of grading history. What is to be expected of 
lists in which no conception of grading is discoverable? 
There are lists for the elementary school which are in 
large part duplicated for the high school, and even for 
college courses in history. In some cases, indeed, the 
chief difference is in the amount of reading suggested, 
and this difference is not always in favor of the ele- 
mentary school. One of the simplest and most success- 
ful of grammar school histories has in its list of refer- 
ences on the American Revolution : Hart, Formation 
of the Union, chapters 3-4 ; Howard, Preliminaries of 
the Revolution, chapters 3-13 ; Van Tyne, American 1 

Revolution, chapters 1-17; Hart, American History told 
by Contemporaries, II, chapters 21-35 ; and half a dozen 
other works of similar grade. One of the most advanced 
textbooks for the senior year of the high school has in 
its list of references on the American Revolution pre- 
cisely the same works, but the readings are less extended. 
The reading in Howard is, for example, chapters 1-5, 
and 15-17, and in Van Tyne, chapters 4-6, and 7-17. 
The works here enumerated are at least fairly accessible. 
There are lists that show, not only a singular lack of 



325 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

discrimination in the matter of grading, but a curious 
disregard of ordinary library resources. A high school 
textbook in United States history, issued by one of the 
best known publishing houses in the country, refers 
to such works as Kingsford's ten-volume History of 
Canada, the collected writings of Adams, Jefferson, 
Franklin, and Dickinson, Force's American Archives, 
the New York State Documents, and the Annual Regis- 
ter for 1765, as familiarly as if these were an indispen- 
sable part of every school library ! 

Before accepting any ready-made list, or attempting 
to draw up an independent list, the teacher should raise 
very definitely and answer very definitely certain fun- 
damental questions. Why is collateral reading essen- 
tial ? What are the main purposes to be served ? What 
kinds of readings are suitable ? What kinds of readings 
shall be required, and what kinds shall be optional? 
Shall the readings be the same for all members of the 
class, or shall they be differentiated? Shall they be 
confined to a few books, or shall the pupil be introduced 
to as many different books as possible? How much 
reading may reasonably be expected? How shall read- 
ings be assigned? How reported? On what prin- 
ciple, or principles, shall materials be collected for a 
small library? for a large library? What constitutes 
a good working library ? 



COLLATERAL READING 329 

The claims for collateral reading have, perhaps, at 
times been exaggerated. It may not be altogether im- 
possible to teach some chemistry "without glass and 
rubber tubing." It may not be altogether impossible 
to teach some history "without reference books." It 
may be that a good textbook, intelligently studied and 
intelligently discussed in class, can be made to yield 
results that are at least respectable. This possibility 
should not be overlooked. Indeed, if the choice, as 
some teachers think, is between knowing one book 
thoroughly and knowing a number of books superficially, 
there is something to be said in favor of the one book. 
At the same time textbooks as a class are not entirely 
self-explanatory to all pupils. Most of them require 
frequent elaboration. The one book cannot be known 
thoroughly without knowing more than the one book 
reveals. The choice, then, is not between one book 
and more than one; it is between elaboration by the 
teacher and elaboration by means of collateral reading. 
European conditions in general favor the former; 
American conditions in general favor the latter. This 
does not mean that the whole burden of elaboration is 
or can be shifted to collateral reading. In any proper 
teaching of history there must be contributions by the 
teacher. But American theories and American condi- 
tions are alike unfavorable to any large amount of oral 



330 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

instruction, and alike force upon most teachers the 
alternative of shifting to collateral reading the main 
burden. 

Collateral reading is needed to make the textbook 
itself intelligible. This suggests : (ij^materials to add- 
\i elements of reality, and (2) materials to add informa- 
tion important as information. There are other needs 
quite as apparent. American conditions demand of 
history teaching something more than atmosphere and 
facts. There are tastes to be cultivated, interests to be 
stimulated, kinds of insight to be developed, and habits 
to be formed, that open of necessity a field beyond the 
textbook. Such further needs suggest : (3) materials 
to make history interesting or inspiring; (4) materials 
to give acquaintance with historical literature; and 
(5) materials to illustrate the historical method of study. 
All of these are needs to be recognized in any scheme of 
collateral reading that professes to be adequate. They 
do not, in all cases, imply different kinds of material. 
The same material may at times serve more than one 
purpose, and should, so far as possible, be adapted to 
more than one purpose. Often, however, conditions 
will require a differentiation of material. In any case 
the purposes themselves should be differentiated, for 
each implies a treatment of material somewhat pecul- 
iar to itself. 



COLLATERAL READING 33 1 

The significance and general conditions of making 
the past real, the materials available for the purpose, 
and their limitations, have been considered in earlier 
chapters. Collateral reading assigned primarily, or 
chiefly, for this purpose should not be treated as material 
to be learned and recited. As already pointed out, 
details in a high degree useful in stimulating the sense 
of reality are often details of a kind that no historian 
would dignify as history, and no teacher ought to 
dignify them as material to be remembered, or even as 
material to be entered in the notebook. They may be 
used as material for dramas, for imaginary letters and 
diaries, and for other exercises that invite in a special 
way conscious effort to turn back the clock of time. 
They may simply be read for impressions, for atmosphere. 
The essential condition is that they should leave behind 
feelings for and about the past. 

Collateral reading assigned primarily, or chiefly, for 
the purpose of adding information important as infor- 
mation presents quite a different problem. Such read- 
ing includes presumably facts that are to be both learned 
and recited. It is, therefore, in all essentials to be 
treated in the same manner as the textbook itself. 
The pupil may be assisted by ready-made outlines, by 
questions, by problems, or by other guiding devices. 
He may be left to find on his own initiative what he 



332 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ought to find, and to report in class his own independent 
summary. He may in all cases be required to enter in 
his notebook the main facts. The reading must, then, 
be of such a character as to lend itself to analysis and 
summary. It is not enough that an account is authori- 
tative and not too long. It is not enough that it is 
easy to read. Many accounts that meet these condi- 
tions defy analysis and leave only the vague impression 
that something tremendously important or surpassingly 
beautiful or hopelessly ugly "passed that way." Such 
dissolving panoramas of adjectives have their place in 
a scheme of collateral reading, but that place is not to 
supply information. If there is to be analysis, there 
must be something in the form of definite, perceptible 
conditions or events to analyze. 

Collateral reading assigned primarily, or chiefly, to 
make history interesting or inspiring should be treated 
merely as good reading. The pupil should feel under 
no compulsion to analyze or to summarize. There 
should be no set questions to answer, no problems to 
solve, no necessary looking forward to any formal 
report, but complete freedom to read because he likes 
it, or to stop reading because he dislikes it. The pupil 
should, however, be encouraged to express his honest 
opinions of the readings as readings. If, as will often 
be the case, he forgets to stop at the end of the assign- 



COLLATERAL READING 333 

ment, if he reads a whole chapter where only one page 
was suggested, or if he reads a whole book where only 
one chapter was suggested, he will want to talk about 
his experience and should have the opportunity. He 
should also be encouraged to copy in his notebook 
passages which, for any reason, arouse his special en- 
thusiasm, and to commit some of them to memory. If, 
on the other hand, as will also often be the case, he 
stops before the end of the assignment, if his sole im- 
pression is one of "I don't like it," or "I hope never to 
see that book again," he should still have an oppor- 
tunity to express his opinion, if only as partial com- 
pensation for weariness occasioned by an unwise assign- 
ment. The test of success is the pleasure derived from 
the reading, the desire created for more reading, and the 
indefinable stirrings and strivings promoted by any 
good reading. 

Collateral reading assigned primarily, or chiefly, to 
give acquaintance with historical literature should be so 
treated as to emphasize the record and the recorder 
rather than what is recorded. The works of historians 
are themselves achievements, in some cases worthy to 
rank with the most notable of the achievements which 
they record, and the historians are themselves in con- 
sequence important historical characters. In any case 
the record is itself the achievement to be considered, 



334 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

and as such cannot be considered entirely apart from 
the recorder. The reading should, therefore, include, 
in addition to passages from the record, some account 
of the recorder, his training for historical investigation, 
his purpose in writing, the kinds of materials which he 
used, his care or lack of care in sifting them, his per- 
sonal bias, the time devoted to his task. Passages in 
the record itself should be selected with a view to indi- 
cating its scope and general characteristics. What 
period does it embrace? what peoples or countries? 
Is it in general of the story- telling, the didactic, or the 
scientific type ? Is its main theme governmental affairs, 
or some other theme ? Does it merely relate and explain 
facts, or does it pass ethical and other judgments upon 
them? Is it glaringly partial to one country or race or 
religion or political system ? Is it easy or hard to read ? 
Is it interesting or dull ? Questions such as these should 
be brought up for brief discussion in class. In con- 
clusion there should be some indication of what, in the 
opinion of to-day, is the value of the record as historical 
literature. 

Collateral reading assigned primarily, or chiefly, to 
illustrate the historical method of study may be treated 
either as material for oral discussion in class or for 
written work to be handed in. The general problem is, 
of course, to convey some impression of how histories are 



COLLATERAL READING 335 

made. This is in part accomplished by such considera- 
tion of the record and the recorder as was suggested in 
the last paragraph. It can be more definitely accom- 
plished by actual exercises in historical criticism and 
construction. These require careful adjustment. The 
pupil should at the beginning go to the materials with 
some simple and specific question or problem, so framed 
as to make him conscious of some specific aspect of his- 
torical study. One exercise may consist merely of 
classifying a source as primary or secondary. Another 
may raise the question, "What does it mean?" An- 
other may raise the question, "Is it true?" In the 
end the pupil should recognize with some degree of clear- 
ness at least that there are different kinds of sources, 
that there are definite processes of criticism, that the 
facts established vary in degree of probability, that 
there are different ways of selecting and combining facts, 
and that there is a special apparatus in the form of 
tables of contents, indexes, footnotes, and systematic 
bibliographical guides to aid him in finding out quickly 
what a book is about, what it has to say on this or that 
topic, what its chief authorities are, and what books or 
articles have been written on any historical subject 
which he may be directed to look up or in which he 
may be interested. 
The material that can be read by children in the first 



336 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

five or six grades of the elementary school is necessarily 
limited. Most of the reading should, therefore, be to 
the class rather than by the class. Emphasis in the 
lower grades will naturally fall upon readings designed 
chiefly to make the past real and interesting. But, 
beginning as early as the fifth or sixth grade, some- 
thing can be done through readings by the teacher for 
the promotion of all the purposes that have been indi- 
cated. The range of possible selection is wider than 
some teachers seem to suspect. "Our learned and more 
exhaustive historical works," says a writer who has 
himself rendered valuable service in providing interest- 
ing material to supplement textbooks, "are beyond the 
reach of most busy people, nor are they adapted to use 
in the schools. Between these two extremes, the con- 
densed textbook and the ponderous volumes of the 
historian, we find many books of great value — biog- 
raphies, memoirs, histories of limited periods or of 
particular localities — but none of these, as far as the 
author knows, is fitted for the use of schools or was 
prepared with that end in view." l Here are enu- 
merated precisely the types of works which, when acces- 
sible, contribute most richly the sort of material needed 
to make history real, intelligible, and interesting. Many 
of them are in places quite as concrete, and therefore 

1 Elson, Side Lights on A merican History, I, p. vii. 



Q 



COLLATERAL READING 337 

quite as simple, as the best of accounts made over 
especially for school use. Many of them are in places 
more concrete, and therefore simpler, than the average 
simplified account. If concreteness is a test of what is 
suitable, it is a mistake to hold, as many teachers do, 
that the availability of historical material for school 
purposes varies inversely with its bulk and historical 
importance. It is, however, at any stage of school 
instruction, a greater mistake to refer indiscriminately 
to "the ponderous volumes of the historian" and to 
"biographies, memoirs, histories of limited periods or of 
particular localities." The passages selected must meet 
the necessary conditions of grading, and the works 
themselves must be reasonably accessible. 

There are some books that should not be made over. 
A protest, voiced, some years ago, against this tendency 
in dealing with literature, applies also to history. "The 
noble heritage of great books that awaits every culti- 
vated person is dealt out ahead of time in shreds and 
patches, in ineffective lumps, in diluted extracts. The 
publishers' catalogues are filled with the titles: tales 
from this master, a child's version of that, vignettes 
from the other. ... All that has made the book 
delightful has been left out, the personal equation, the 
living presence of the writer as perceived in his im- 
mortal words, for these have been displaced by two 



33§ TEACHING OF HISTORY 

syllabled imitations. The spark of the divine has been 
quenched. And there is really no stopping place. As 
writers multiply, new incursions will be made. We 
may have The Child's Own Faust, Machiavelli for Little 
Tots, Rabelais in Simple Words, The Westminster Con- 
fession in Easy Rhymes, Little Dramas from JEschy- 
lus." l History, like literature, may be spoiled by 
bringing it "down to the child's effortless understand- 
ing." More history can be read to children before they 
are able to read anything themselves and more can be 
done in shaping their tastes for historical reading than 
is commonly supposed. It would be an abnormal 
fourth grade that could read with ease and certainty 
the works of Francis Parkman, but any one who has 
tried it knows that a fourth grade by no means abnormal 
will listen with pleasure to a teacher's readings from 
Parkman. Where such a course is not possible, it is 
better to defer to a later stage the introduction of the 
material than to give it over to the dull hand of pedagogy 
for adaptation. 

Readings to the class have a place in history teach- 
ing throughout the entire school course. This is es- 
pecially true of readings designed to kindle interest and 
enthusiasm. The teacher who reads well can make 
many a passage effective which even seniors in the high 

1 Educational Bi-Monthly, February, 1908, p. 225. 



COLLATERAL READING 339 

school might on their own account read listlessly or 
entirely neglect. Many such readings will be sug- 
gested by the discussions which spring up during the 
class period, and these are often more impressive than 
readings carefully planned in advance. On one occa- 
sion, in a class not given to much enthusiasm, a mild 
curiosity concerning Napoleon's speech before the 
Battle of the Pyramids led the teacher to pick up a 
book from the desk and read the speech. The words 
caught the fancy of the class and, for perhaps the first 
time, lifted every member out of boredom. "Say," 
exclaimed one of the boys, "that's pretty good, isn't 
it?" The teacher wisely took advantage of the dis- 
covery and by the end of the year had a class respon- 
sive beyond all expectation. 

Collateral reading by the class should, however, begin 
not later than the sixth grade, and above the seventh 
grade may with profit be made a part of the daily 
preparation. Here again some of the most effective 
assignments will, throughout the course, be those sug- 
gested directly by class discussions. Again and again 
the wise teacher will interrupt discussion and suggest 
some reading as a basis for continuing the discussion at 
the next meeting of the class. But there should also 
be regular readings carefully planned in advance. Some 
of these will be for information to be reported in class 



34° TEACHING OF HISTORY 

by designated individuals. Others will be readings for 
groups of pupils, or for the entire class. Readings for 
elaboration of the textbook and readings to illustrate 
the historical method should, as a rule, be the same for 
all and required of all. Readings for inspiration may at 
first be required, but, if at all successful, may later be 
left largely optional. Readings to give acquaintance 
with historical literature may be required the first time 
a work is introduced. Later readings in the same work 
may be made optional. 

The extent to which the various purposes of collateral 
reading can be served will depend somewhat upon the 
nature of the textbook. With some textbooks the 
need of elaboration to make the book intelligible will 
be suggested by almost every page. The other kinds 
of readings will then be somewhat limited. Every 
effort should, however, be made to convey to pupils 
some impression of each of the fields. With some text- 
books the need of elaboration will be felt only in the 
treatment of certain special topics. The readings can 
then be devoted largely to inspiration and to illustra- 
tions of historical literature and of the historical method. 
The system of readings should in any case provide for 
alternations of what is required and what is optional, 
so as to include in turn different types of readings under 
each. 



A 



COLLATERAL READING 34 I 

In the assignment of collateral reading the first rule 
is to avoid waste of time in making the assignment. 
The lists of readings for a week, or for two weeks, should 
either be mimeographed and distributed in class or 
posted in some convenient place. The second rule is to 
avoid waste of time in finding the books. Each class 
should, so far as possible, have a reserve shelf, open 
without any preliminaries and within easy reach. 
There should also be designated reading periods so ar- 
ranged as to prevent conflicts in the use of books. The 
smaller the library, the greater the need of such ad- 
justment. A class may, for example, be divided into 
two sections, A and B. Each section may then be sub- 
divided into smaller groups, i, 2, 3, 4. The groups 
should represent at least a rough grading of abilities, 
group 1 consisting of the best readers, and group 4 of 
those to whom the wind must be somewhat carefully 
tempered. Section A may have as special reading days 
Mondays and Wednesdays, section B, Tuesdays and 
Thursdays, Fridays being set aside as general clearance 
days for both sections. With the readings arranged in 
groups, each pupil will look for his group number, and, 
knowing his section, A or B, will know when he is to 
do his reading. Where there are regular study hours 
during the school day, these should, so far as possible, 
be used for the reading. Where there are no such study 



342 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

hours, provision must be made for taking books home 
on reading days, and this, with a small library, may 
necessitate further divisions of the class. A good test 
of the degree of interest aroused will often be furnished 
by the calls for material on clearance days. 

References thus assigned in any field should, while 
the field is new, designate definite pages and often speci- 
fied passages definitely marked in the books, but some 
independent searching for material should from the 
outset be encouraged. Where the library equipment is 
sufficient, there should usually be for each group three 
or four different references illustrative of different 
kinds of material, with instructions to the pupil to read 
the first and one or more of the others. The independent 
search for material should at first be confined to the 
books included in the regular list of readings. The 
simplest arrangement is to set for the entire class some 
one question the answer to which is to be found some- 
where in the books of each group. After the pupils 
have acquired some facility in the use of indexes and 
tables of contents the references may omit pages and 
simply suggest topics to be found in one or more of 
the assigned books. Still later, topics may be included 
without reference to any specified material, the pupils 
being left to find both the book and the place in the 
book. 



) 



COLLATERAL READING 343 



Beginning with the seventh grade each pupil should be 
required to keep a record of his reading. He should 
note at least : 

1. Full name of the author. 

2. Full title of the work. 

3. Number of volumes, publisher, place and date of 
publication. 

4. Number of pages read. 

5. Personal impression. 

Under personal impression the pupil should enter 
passages that make a special appeal, statements that 
differ from those of the text or from statements made 
in class, questions raised by the reading which he would 
like to know more about, and any other matter of direct 
personal interest. Often the only entry to be expected 
will be "interesting," or "dry," "I don't like this 
book," or "I like it very much." The important point 
is to get an honest entry. Such a record is of value 
both to the pupil and the teacher. It furnishes a fairly 
clear indication of what is suitable at different stages, 
of the steps in the development of the ability to read, 
and of taste for reading. 

What pupils can read, what they will read, and how 
much, are questions to be answered by experiment. A 
teacher feeling his way may begin with selections sug- 
gested by the textbook. If these are of different types 




At^r\uW^° 



TEACHING OF HISTORY 

— standard historical works, sources, and books pre- 
pared especially for children — he may include in each 
group one example of each and require the class to read 
something from each. A seventh grade may, for ex- 
ample, be given the following assignments on the Pil- 
grims : 

i. Eggleston, Beginners of a Nation, 159-181. 
Higginson, American Explorers, 311-337. 
Gordy, Leaders and Heroes, 64-79. 

2. Scribner's Popular History, I, 385-399. 
Higginson, American Explorers, 311-337. 
Wright, Stories of American History, 300-315. 

3. Fiske, Beginnings of New England, 73-86. 
Higginson, American Explorers, 311-337. 
Coffin, Old Times in the Colonies, 111-126. 

4. Higginson, Larger History, 153-158. 
Higginson, American Explorers, 311-337. 
Dodge, Stories of American History, 18-25. 

Special question for all : Why did the Pilgrims leave 
Holland? 

The first discussion of such readings should deal with 
the personal impressions of pupils. If the teacher 
learns, as is likely to be the case, that a seventh grade 
cannot understand Eggleston, and that this reference is 
reported by all of the first group as "very hard," he will 
find it illuminating to analyze the work with a view to 
discovering why it is hard. If he learns that Higgin- 



RAL READING 345 

son's American Explorers is the most popular book on 
the list and that one of the children's books is con- 
demned because "it is so preachy," he will again find it 
illuminating to examine with special care the material. 
In this way any teacher of ordinary industry will in 
time learn definitely what is most suitable and least 
suitable. 

Beyond the pupil's personal impression little should 
at first be reported in class, except in the case of read- 
ings assigned specifically for information. One cardinal 
mistake of many teachers is practically to limit readings 
to information, or at least to treat all readings as if 
information concerning the subject matter constituted 
the one important consideration. There must be read- 
ings for information. The emphasis laid upon facts is 
entirely deserved. But the greater part of the reading 
ought to be for inspiration, for the cultivation of tastes, 
for insight, and for the formation of habits. Facts, 
after all, come and go. Tastes, insight, and habits 
remain. 

Having determined as definitely as possible the uses 
to be made of a library, the teacher is prepared to in- 
quire what kind of library is necessary. Where the 
money allowance is small, an initial error is often com- 
mitted in the selection of material. With only $5 or $10 
available, the common procedure is to buy textbooks, 



34^ TEACHING OF HISTORY 

or other brief general treatises, and inexpensive source 
books. In this way the entire field is covered, but the 
outside reading made possible on any particular topic is 
necessarily meager. The principle in such cases is first 
to buy a library and then to see what can be done with 
it. A better principle for teachers with slender re- 
sources would be to determine first what topics are in 
special need of elaboration, what kinds of inspiration, 
what kinds of historical literature, and what kinds of 
illustration of the historical method are most desirable, 
and then fit the library to meet the conditions. The 
teacher is justified in beginning with topics about which 
he happens to know something, or, if he is equally in- 
formed on all topics, in beginning with a few of special 
current interest. One of these is, let us say, the Monroe 
Doctrine. With an appropriation of five cents the 
teacher can secure Old South Leaflet No. 36, containing 
Monroe's message and comments by historians. For 
ten cents more, American History Leaflet No. 4 can be 
added. This contains extracts from documents embody- 
ing the doctrine, 1789-1901. For $1.25 more, Gilman's 
Monroe can be added. With a total appropriation of 
$10 or $12, the teacher can, on this principle, collect 
materials on half a dozen special topics in American 
history, superior to the materials furnished even by 
detailed histories, or, with the same appropriation, can 



COLLATERAL READING 347 

collect really illuminating materials on special topics 
ranging over the entire field of the history course. 

Where the resources are less limited, the teacher may 
begin with a consideration of the elements that should 
be present in a general historical collection. He wishes, 
let us say, to have typical examples of the different kinds 
of historical material. Still selecting to some extent with 
reference to special topics, he decides that there should 
be: i. Bibliography ; 2. Historical geography ; 3. Local 
history; 4. Standard comprehensive histories ; 5. Some 
special treatises on special topics or on limited periods ; 
6. Biography; 7. Sources, including collections of extracts 
and some fuller works, especially diaries, reminiscences, 
autobiographies, and letters. For the selection of ma- 
terials of all the kinds here indicated, and for others, 
there is a serviceable annotated guide which can be 
purchased for sixty cents : Andrews, Gambrill, and Tall, 
A Bibliography of History for Schools and Libraries. 
Twenty-five dollars, it may be added, is sufficient to 
secure some representation of all the kinds of material 
named, including both European and American history. 

The principle of building up a library in strict accord- 
ance with predetermined needs, whether applied in 
either of the ways suggested, or in some other way, 
emphasizes early in the course of selection the need of 
duplicating materials. The common plan of buying as 



348 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

many different works as possible is of doubtful value 
to any average school. It is better, in making addi- 
tions to a small library, to buy six copies of one really 
serviceable work than to buy six different works. In 
a library of any considerable size, 500 volumes or 
more, there should be several duplicate sets even of 
the more comprehensive histories, in the field of Amer- 
ican history, for example, at least three or four sets 
of Schouler, Henry Adams, McMaster, and Rhodes. 
Only the largest libraries can afford the indulgence of 
extending their lists of different titles as far as possible. 
A small library selected for definite use and used 
definitely is the best argument for securing from school 
boards additional funds. Teachers of history have in 
the past been too modest. They have accepted too 
philosophically a condition which stocks the depart- 
ments of biology, chemistry, and physics with expen- 
sive apparatus and leaves the history shelves absurdly 
inadequate. They have been reconciled too easily to 
v/ textbook instruction. The fault is in large part their 
own. They have failed to realize the needs and possi- 
bilities of collateral reading, and have, in consequence, 
allowed a tradition to develop which is now often a 
serious obstacle even to the most competent teachers. 
But it is never too late to struggle against a bad tradi- 
tion. Most teachers of history now look upon a library 



x/ 



COLLATERAL READING 349 

as indispensable. It remains to convince many school 
administrators that a library is indispensable. The 
general mode of attack is clear. It is to use the little 
material that may be available so effectively that appeals 
for more can be based upon concrete results. 



CHAPTER XIV 

School History and the Historical Method 

To most teachers, most of the time, history for school 
purposes presents itself as a body of assured knowledge, 
selected portions of which are to be interpreted, learned, 
and, so far as possible, applied to life in the present. 
Some teachers seem to believe that history may literally 
set forth the truth and nothing but the truth. For this 
there is distinguished precedent. Eighteenth century 
Johnson, according to Macaulay, with a touch of the 
literary critic's contempt for historians, put the case 
very simply. "The historian tells either what is false 
or what is true : in the former case he is no historian : 
in the latter he has no opportunity for displaying his 
abilities : for truth is one : and all who tell the truth 
must tell it alike." x In a vein not altogether different 
it is related of Fustel de Coulanges, nineteenth century 
critical historian, that one day when he was lecturing 
and his students broke into applause, he stopped 
them with the remark, "Do not applaud me, it is 

1 Macaulay, Essays, three- volume edition, I, 276. 
3SO 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 351 

not I who address you ; it is history which speaks 
through me." l 

That there is a residuum of assured historical knowl- 
edge is not to be denied. Without it history could have 
little claim to differentiation from fiction. The residuum 
is in fact so large that the idea of drawing exclusively 
upon it for school purposes may seem entirely feasible. 
In practice that idea has, however, not been realized. 
If many of the textbooks and some of the popular his- 
tories used in school convey a different impression, if 
they are in general pervaded by an atmosphere of un- 
disputed verity, the effect is, in large part, achieved by 
the arbitrary device of elevating opinions based upon 
incomplete evidence to the rank of clearly established 
truth. It is by means of this device that some of the 
most familiar personages, conditions, and events have, 
for school purposes, been withdrawn from the realm of 
controversy. Take the case of Columbus. In a well- 
known and deservedly popular textbook we read : 

Christopher Columbus, the great discoverer, was born in 
Genoa, Italy, about 1436. He spent most of his early life at 
sea, and became an experienced navigator. He was a man who 
read widely, and intelligently. When on shore, his trade was 
the designing and making of maps. This occupation led him 
to think much about the shape of the earth, and he came to agree 

1 Congress of Arts and Sciences, St. Louis, 1904, II, 158. 



352 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

with those men who held that the earth is round like a globe. 
This belief led him to conclude that Asia could be reached by 
sailing westward and that a new route to India could be opened. 

The account is accompanied by a portrait, labeled 
"Christopher Columbus." 

The facts sum up in a typical manner the Columbus 
of our elementary schools, and, as here presented, make 
a very simple and reasonable kind of history. It is 
interesting to know how Columbus looked, where he 
came from, and how he made up his mind that India 
could be reached by sailing westward. But is the 
assurance warranted? A larger and more critical his- 
tory informs us that while a number of portraits exist 
with claims to the honor of representing Columbus, 
"there is no likeness whose claim is indisputable." 1 
Concerning the date of birth and the genesis of the 
ideas that led to the discovery of America another 
critical historian writes : 

Christopher Columbus was born at some time between 1430 
and 1456, the precise date of this event being of slight importance 
nowadays, save to him who seeks to conjure up a picture of the 
great seaman as he paced the deck of his flagship off San Salvador 
on that pregnant October night in 1492. Henry Harisse and 
Justin Winsor unite in giving the date as 1446-47, and when these 
two agree one may as well follow them without more ado. Eight- 
een places claim Columbus as a native, but scholars unite in giving 
that honor to Genoa or its immediate vicinity. At an early age 
1 Winsor, America, II, 69. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 353 

he shipped on his first voyage, and kept on sailing the seas until, 
some years later, he found himself in Portugal, the fifteenth 
century meeting place of adventurous and scientific seamen. 

Exactly how or when Columbus made up his mind as to the 
shape of the earth, the feasibility of sailing westward to India, 
and determined to do it, is not clear. Ferdinand Columbus, for 
instance, tells us that the admiral was influenced by the works 
of Arab astronomers and by Ptolemy and the ancients. But 
whether this should be taken in more than a general sense may 
be doubted. Another theory is that Columbus, studying the 
Imago Mundi of Pierre D'Ailly, Bishop of Cambray, came across 
the old ideas which that compiler had borrowed from Roger 
Bacon. The first printed copy of the Imago Mundi was made at 
Louvain not before 1480 ; but Columbus thought that the earth 
was round before that time and there is no evidence that he ever 
read the Bishop of Cambray's work in manuscript. It is true 
that in the report of his third voyage (1498) he quoted a sentence 
from this book, and there still exists a copy of it with marginal 
notes in his handwriting, or in that of his brother, Bartholomew, 
for the writing of the two was much alike. But none of these 
things proves that he had read the work in manuscript, nor is 
there reason to suppose that the theories of the ancients had 
much, if any, direct influence upon him. If he had known of the 
Bishop of Cambray's book before 1492, it is most probable that 
he would have used it as an authority to reinforce his ideas ; but 
there is no evidence that he did this. Another way to account for 
Columbus's opinions is to attribute great influence to the letters of 
Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli of Florence. Sir Clements R. Markham 
even goes so far as to print them as the "sailing directions of 
Columbus." A more recent writer, Henry Vignaud, has gone to 
the other extreme and has denied that such letters ever existed. 1 

1 Charming, History of the United States, I, 14-15. 



354 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Many teachers who habitually treat history in school 
as assured knowledge are, of course, aware of doubts 
lurking behind, not only individual facts, but behind 
the selection and organization of facts. They know 
that individual facts, even when true, may yet in combi- 
nation fail to convey the truth. They agree with Ma- 
caulay that one writer may even tell less truth than 
another by telling more truths. But school conditions 
seem to them to render dogmatism both necessary and 
desirable. There is, in the first place, the question of 
what is possible. History of the kind in which an 
author writes as if he really knows presents difficulties. 
History of the kind in which an author writes as if nobody 
really knows introduces complications which many 
teachers consider unsuitable for children, beyond their 
range of interests, and confusing, even to the average 
adult. To be told in substance, that there was once a 
man by the name of Christopher Columbus who made 
up his mind that India could be reached by sailing west- 
ward, and that considerable energy, most of it vain, has 
been expended in trying to find out when and where 
he was born and how he reached his epoch-making con- 
clusion may be satisfying to historical experts ; it neither 
can nor ought to be satisfying to others. Both for chil- / 
dren and for the general reading public, history, to be 
read at all, must be something definite to believe about 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 355 

the past and not something to be doubted or argued 
about. If there are controversies, they must, therefore, 
be forcibly suppressed. 

There are, in the second place, uses of history to 
which, it is often urged, the subject must at any cost 
be subordinated. Balanced opinions, and arguments 
that lead chiefly to doubt, are, even if manageable, 
at best uninspiring and at worst positively harmful 
to childhood and youth. They are, therefore, to be 
avoided, and even resented. "There is a certain med- 
dlesome spirit," says Washington Irving, at the end 
of his account of the early years of Columbus and of 
the origin of the idea of a western voyage, " which, in 
the garb of learned research, goes prying about the 
traces of history, casting down its monuments, and mar- 
ring and mutilating its fairest trophies. Care should 
be taken to vindicate great names from such pernicious 
erudition. It defeats one of the most salutary purposes 
of history, that of furnishing examples of what human 
genius and laudable enterprise may accomplish." * 
Many teachers find in the "salutary purposes of his- 
tory" a justification for eliminating controversy. 

There is, in the third place, a feeling that such exag- 
geration of historical probability as may result from a 
dogmatic treatment need excite no special concern. 
1 Columbus, Book I, end of Chapter V. 



356 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

School history, it is argued, is in most cases destined to 
an early oblivion, and if, in some cases, remnants do sur- 
vive, it is at worst better to go through life with a few 
definite errors than to think of history as something 
that might have been either this or that, and was prob- 
ably neither. " It's all in confidence," says a delight- 
ful essayist, protesting, on behalf of the " Gentle Reader," 
against the ways of the critical historian, "speak out 
as one gentleman to another under a friendly roof! 
What do you think about it ? No matter if you make a 
mistake or two, I'll forget most that you say anyway." 1 
Shall doubts, then, be suppressed? Shall mere per- 
sonal opinions, mere guesses, and sometimes mere 
fancies be combined on terms of complete equality with 
indisputable facts? Shall the study of history concern 
itself only with the meaning of an author ? Shall there be 
no distinction between his story, with the emphasis upon 
the his, and history ? In the opinion of a growing minor- 
ity of history teachers, both in Europe and in America, 
to ask such questions is in effect to ask whether the school 
view of history shall be intelligent or unintelligent. 
■ The history learned in school unquestionably makes 
its heaviest contribution to oblivion. But there are 
some results which endure. The treatment of history 
as assured knowledge prepares for the treatment of his- 

1 Crothers, Gentle Reader, 173. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 357 

tory as assured knowledge. The tendency of pupils 
accustomed in school to accept facts as facts without 
discrimination is to continue in after life to accept and 
to use facts without discrimination. The tendency of 
pupils accustomed in school to look upon the printed 
page itself as evidence of the truth of what is printed is 
to continue in after life in subjection to the tyranny of 
the printed page. So natural and so strong are these 
tendencies that they sometimes persist even after 
university courses in history. It was a graduate stu- 
dent who, some years ago, asked a professor of history 
whether, if Lincoln had lived, there would have been any 
conflict between the President and Congress, and who, 
on receiving in answer a qualified affirmative, asked to 
have authorities cited in exactly the same spirit as if the 
question had been, "When did Lincoln die? " All efforts 
to show the difference between finding out what actually 
was and finding out what might have been if something 
that was had been different proved unavailing. The 
student returned the next day with a look of triumph. 
"I thought," said he, "that you must be wrong about 
Lincoln," and read from a popular history an extract 
to the effect that Lincoln would have had no trouble 
in carrying through Congress the reconstruction policy 
which in the hands of Andrew Johnson met with disas- 
trous defeat. 



358 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

There are degrees of probability even in the history 
that might have been. The case for Lincoln is no 
doubt better than many other similar cases. Between 
information supplied by schoolboys gravely debating 
what would have happened if George Washington had 
never been born and information supplied by states- 
men gravely debating what George Washington would 
have done with the Philippines there is no doubt a 
reasonable choice. But speculations on what might 
have been are in all cases speculation. They are so 
common and so easy to detect that the most casual 
reader might be expected to place them in a class apart 
at least from the history alleged to have actually hap- 
pened. Children in the grades can grasp the distinc- 
tion when attention is called to it. The fact, established 
by repeated tests, that neither children in the grades 
nor casual readers, to go no farther, ordinarily think even 
of this simple distinction renders unnecessary any illus- 
tration of their general attitude toward more subtle 
distinctions. 

The desirability of discrimination in dealing with 
historical data is too apparent for argument. Not all 
of us read histories, but all of us begin with the first 
dawning of intelligence to use facts known to us his- 
torically and not directly. It is a commonplace that 
most of our conversation is narrative and historical, 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 359 

whether the subject be what we, our friends, or some 
other person, said or did this morning, or what was 
said or done a hundred or a thousand years ago. It 
is a commonplace that data historical in character 
enter into most of the thinking and planning of life 
from childhood to the grave. It ought to be a common- 
place that schoolroom history should give the pupil 
some consciousness of what historical knowledge is and 
some training in the method by which historical knowl- 
edge is established. It ought to be a commonplace 
that there are "salutary purposes" to be served by his- 
tory as a process of determining, selecting, and arrang- 
ing facts, not less important than those to be served by 
history as the organized result. 

Training in the historical method of study is a some- 
what formidable expression difficult to dissociate from 
university work. But the teacher must not be fright- 
ened by what may appear to be pretentious termi- 
nology. We speak of history in the elementary school 
and history in the university, without prejudice to 
either. It is convenient, and it ought to be possible, 
to speak of the historical method in both, without 
prejudice to either. Certainly the processes thus de- 
scribed — the search for material, the classification 
and criticism of material, the determination of particu- 
lar facts, the selection and arrangement of facts — pre- 



360 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

sent elementary aspects. A first grade can be led to 
see that something is learned about the Indians from 
things dug up out of the ground, something from writings 
of white men who reported what they saw, and some- 
thing from stories told by Indians about themselves 
and later reported by white men. First-grade children 
will themselves often suggest that the Indians did not 
write books. A fourth grade can be led to think of 
different ways of knowing about people, and of the 
relative merits of the different ways of knowing about 
them. A sixth grade can be taught the use of indexes 
and tables of contents and something of the significance 
of references to authorities. A seventh grade can be 
led to solve some simple problems in criticism. From 
the first, there can be exercises in putting facts together, 
and, above the seventh grade, exercises involving essen- 
tial aspects of the historical method of study from the 
search for material to the organization and exposition 
of results. 

Those who are aware of the possibilities have some- 
times gone the length of declaring that history, as early 
at least as the high school, should be habitually, and 
almost exclusively, presented as a process of establish- 
ing, selecting, and organizing facts. This is the "source 
method" in its extreme form. The more conservative 
view, and the one here adopted, is that the greater part 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 36 1 

of school history must be presented as ready-made 
information, but that there should be illustrations of the 
historical method sufficient to indicate the general 
nature of the problems behind organized history, and 
sufficient to give some definite training in the solution 
of such problems. How shall this be accomplished? 

Here, let us say, is a teacher of a fourth or a fifth 
grade who is called upon by the course of study to dis- 
cuss with her class some of the peoples of antiquity. 
She has discovered that for certain subjects Herodotus 
seems to be a mine of information, and that somehow 
he has mastered the art of telling a story so as to be 
interesting even in a translation. He is to be used 
mainly for information, but the teacher believes that the 
children's interest will not be lessened by raising here 
and there the question of how Herodotus gathered his 
information. The role of father of history, which he 
has played so long, lends, it may be, a peculiar sense of 
fitness to the idea of raising the question first with him. 
She begins with a few preliminary questions : What 
people are there in the world besides Americans ? How 
do you know ? Who are the oldest people in the world ? 

On one occasion a girl knew that there were Germans 
in the world because she had heard her mother speak of 
a German woman. The teacher wrote on the black- 
board : "We may know of people by hearing about 



362 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

them." A boy knew that there were Indians in the 
world because he had read about them in a book. The 
teacher wrote: "We may know of people by reading 
about them." Another boy knew that there were 
Chinamen in the world because he had seen a Chinaman. 
He spoke with an air of conviction that seemed to ex- 
press disapproval of hearsay or books as evidence, and 
a new look of intelligence swept over the class. They 
had all seen a Chinaman. The teacher wrote : "We 
may know of people by seeing them." Before this 
last statement had been put on the board the children 
were discussing the relative merits of the three ways 
that had been suggested of knowing about people. It 
was unanimously agreed that the Indians were the 
oldest people in the world, on the ground, as one mem- 
ber of the class put it, that "they are the first people we 
read about in school." This was the crudest piece of 
reasoning developed during the lesson. The children 
were told that the question was one which appeared to 
have been raised a long time ago in Egypt, for a traveler 
who went there has told us a story about it. A line was 
drawn on the blackboard to represent ten years, the 
average age of the pupils. With this as a unit the line 
was continued to represent a century. It was then 
extended century by century across the blackboard of 
three sides of the room until the twenty-five centuries 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 363 

back to Herodotus had been measured. In this way the 
children were at least made conscious that Herodotus 
lived a very long time ago. They had already heard 
of Egypt and had formed some impression of where 
Egypt is. The story as told by Herodotus was then 
read. 

The Egyptians before the reign of their king Psammetichus 
believed themselves to be the oldest of mankind. Psammetichus, 
however, wished to find out if this was true. So he took two 
children of the common sort and gave them over to a herdsman 
to bring up, charging him to let no one speak a word in their 
presence, but to keep them in a cottage by themselves, and take 
to them food and look after them in other respects. His object 
herein was to know, after the first babblings of infancy were over, 
what word they would speak first. The herdsman did as he was 
told for two years, and at the end of that time on his opening the 
door of their room and going in, the children both ran up to him 
with outstretched arms and called, " Becos." When this first 
happened, the herdsman took no notice ; but afterwards when he 
observed on coming often to see them that the word was con- 
stantly in their mouths, he told the King and by his command 
brought the children into the King's presence. Psammetichus 
himself then heard them say the word, upon which he proceeded 
to ask what people there were who had anything they called 
" Becos." Hereupon he' learned that Becos was the Phrygian word 
for bread. The Egyptians then gave up claiming that they were 
the oldest people in the world and agreed that the Phrygians were 
older than they. 

Children, even in a fourth grade, will readily antici- 
pate the later steps in this story, if given the opportunity. 



364 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

In a fifth or sixth grade they are almost sure to raise 
on their own motion objections to the conclusion which 
the Egyptians are alleged to have drawn from the 
experiment. Discussion is almost sure to lead some one 
to suggest that the story is probably not true, and to ask 
if Herodotus really thought it was true, or expected 
anybody else to think so. This raises naturally the 
question of where Herodotus got the story anyway. 
The reading is resumed : 

That these were the real facts, I learned at Memphis from 
the priests of Vulcan. The Greeks told other stories of how the 
children were brought up, but the priests said that the bringing 
up was as I have stated it. I got much other information from 
conversation with these priests while I was at Memphis and I 
even went to Heliopolis and to Thebes expressly to try whether 
the priests of those places would agree in their accounts with the 
priests at Memphis. 1 

The children thus see at once that Herodotus knew of 
the experiment credited to Psammetichus only through 
"hearing about it." With this introduction children so 
fortunate as to be allowed to travel for some weeks 
afterward with Herodotus are found to be more or less 
on the alert to discover when he is talking about things 
that he has really seen and when he is talking about 
things that he has merely heard or read. Work thus 
begun with Herodotus may easily be extended so as to 
1 Herodotus, Book II, 2, 3. Slightly adapted. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 365 

include along with information about the Greeks and 
Romans some impression of Thucydides, Xenophon, 
Plutarch, Livy, and Tacitus. 

For an initial exercise in American history in raising 
the question of how we know, the adventures of the 
manuscript of Bradford's History of Plymouth Planta- 
tion furnish material of similar grade for devising an 
introduction to Bradford's work, which may then be 
followed somewhat after the manner proposed for He- 
rodotus. The story of the manuscript is told in the edi- 
tion published by the state of Massachusetts and, more 
briefly, in the edition included in the Original Narratives 
series published by Scribner's Sons. Materials for ex- 
tending the work to other writers of the colonial period 
may be found in Higginson's Young Folks' Book of 
American Explorers. 

When the stage is reached at which children begin to 
use formal textbooks, these may serve as the point of 
departure for occasional illustration of how histories 
are made. It is the duty of teachers to point out recog- 
nized errors. Incidentally this may be turned to ac- 
count in showing what is really involved in getting at 
the truth about a matter in history. In the seventh 
grade the colonial period is usually treated for the 
first time with some degree of seriousness. Probably 
no subject of equal importance in that period has been 



366 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

dealt with so carelessly by textbook writers as that of 
colonial boundaries. This subject is as likely as any 
to furnish ground in need of being cleared up by the 
teacher. It may therefore be allowed to supply an 
illustration. 

A well-known textbook has the following account of 
the boundary provisions of the charter of 1606 : 

To the London Company the king granted the coast of North 
America about from Cape Fear to the mouth of the Potomac ; to 
the Plymouth Company he granted the coast abdiut from Long 
Island to Nova Scotia. These grants were to go ir^ straight strips, 
or zones, across the continent from the Atlantic Ocean to the 
Pacific (for so little was known about North American geography 
that a good many people believed the continent up here to be no 
wider than in Mexico). As for the middle strip, starting from the 
coast between the Potomac and the Hudson, it was open to the 
two companies, with the understanding that neither was to plant 
a colony within 100 miles of any settlement already begun by the 
other. This meant practically that it was likely to be controlled 
by whichever company should first come into the field with a 
flourishing colony. This made it worth while to act promptly. 

An average seventh grade can read and interpret this 
paragraph. Several textbooks have maps showing the 
parallel strips running across the continent. If the 
particular text in use does not contain such- a map, 
pupils can readily work one out on the board with the 
assistance of the teacher. How did the writer of this 
paragraph know that the boundaries were as he has 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 367 

described them? Let the class make suggestions. A 
little discussion will prepare the way for reference to 
the charter itself. The charter may then be studied 
in the manner indicated in the chapter on the use of 
maps. 1 

The study will naturally conclude with a comparison 
of the two maps. Can both be right? Which is 
wrong? Compare with the map, if there is one, in the 
textbook that may be in the hands of the class. It 
should be said that the textbook quoted has a footnote 
explaining that the sea to sea provision was added by 
the charter of 1609. But even that charter did not 
provide for "straight strips, or zones." 

Whether a textbook is right or wrong in the matter, 
the difference between taking the textbook conclusion 
ready-made and taking our own conclusions worked out 
from the charter itself is the difference between learn- 
ing the answer to a problem and working the problem. 
A single exercise of this kind, by giving an impression 
of the nature of the problem, makes any later reference 
to boundary questions in the colonies more intelligible. 

The question asked of the charter was merely, " What 
does it mean?" The source was accepted as authori- 
tative. Other sources raise the further question, "Is it 
true?" For an^exercise involving the latter a seventh 

1 See above, p. 263. 



368 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

grade may be asked to find out whether Pocahontas 
did or did not save the life of Captain John Smith. 
The teacher may first read the following extract from 
Smith's True Relation, an account written in 1607. 

Arriving at Weramocomoco, their Emperour proudly lying 
upon a Bedstead a foote high, upon tenne or twelve Mattes, richly 
hung with manie Chaynes of great Pearles about his necke, and 
covered with a great Covering of Rahaughcums. At heade sat 
a woman, at his feete another ; on each side sitting uppon a Matte 
uppon the ground, were raunged his chiefe men on each side the 
fire, tenne in a ranke, and behinde them as many yong women, 
each a great Chaine of white Beades over their shoulders, their 
heades painted in redde : and with such a grave and Majesticall 
countenance as drave me into admiration to see such state in a 
naked Salvage, hee kindly welcomed me with good wordes, and 
great Platters of sundrie Victuals, assuring mee his friendship, 
and my liber tie within foure days. 1 

This may be followed by Smith's later description of 
the same scene, first published in 1624. 

At last they brought him to Meronocomo, where was Pow- 
hatan their Emperor. Here more than two hundred of those grim 
Courtiers stood wondering at him, as he had beene a monster; 
till Powhatan and his trayne had put themselves in their greatest 
braveries. Before a fire upon a seat like a bedstead, he sat covered 
with a great robe, made of Rarowcun skinnes, and all the tayles 
hanging by. On either hand did sit a young wench of 16 or 18 
yeares, and along on each side the house, two rowes of men, and 

1 Original Narratives of Early American History, Narratives of Early 
Virginia, 48. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 369 

behind them as many women, with all their heads and shoulders 
painted red ; many of their heads bedecked with the white downe 
of Birds ; but everyone with something : and a great chayne of 
white beads about their necks. At his entrance before the King, 
all the people gave a great shout. The Queene of Appamatuck 
was appointed to bring him water to wash his hands, and another 
brought him a bunch of feathers, in stead of a Towell to dry them : 
having feasted him after their best barbarous manner they could, 
a long consultation was held, but the conclusion was, two great 
stones were brought before Powhatan : then as many as could 
layd hands on him, dragged him to them, and thereon laid his head, 
and being ready with their clubs, to beate out his braines, Poca- 
hontas the Kings dearest daughter, when no intreaty could pre- 
vaile, got his head in her armes, and laid her owne upon his to 
save him from death : whereat the Emperour was contented he 
should live to make him hatchets, and her bells, beads, and copper. 1 

Can both accounts be true? The publisher of the 
True Relation says in the preface: "Somewhat more 
was by him written, which being as I thought (fit to be 
private) I would not adventure to make it publicke." 2 
Might this have included the death sentence and the 
rescue by Pocahontas? Or might Smith have been 
so occupied with other matters when he was writing in 
1607 that it did not occur to him to mention the narrow 
escape from death? In 1616 Pocahontas, then the wife 
of John Rolfe, went to England, where she attracted 

1 Generall Historie of Virginia, in Travels of Captaine John Smith, 
Glasgow, 1907, I, 101. 

1 Narratives of Early Virginia, 31. 

2B 



37° TEACHING OF HISTORY 

much attention. Might Smith then have been reminded 
that he owed his life to her, or did he merely make up 
the story to attract attention to himself? Pocahontas 
died in 1 617. A story not unlike that told by Smith 
in 1624 had appeared in English in 1609, in a narrative 
of the expedition of De Soto. Juan Ortiz was, like Smith, 
captured by Indians and brought before their chief. 
"By command of Ucita, Juan Ortiz was bound hand and 
foot to four stakes, .... that he might be burned ; but a 
daughter of the chief entreated that he might be spared. 
Though one Christian, she said, might do no good, cer- 
tainly he could do no harm, and it would be an honour 
to have one for a captive ; to which the father acceded, 
directing the injuries to be healed." * Might Smith 
have read this story and remembered it in rewriting the 
account of his own adventures? His own account of 
how he was saved by Pocahontas is the sole source of 
information confirming the incident. 

Such exercises require some skill in presentation, but, 
when well managed, stimulate thought and excite a high 
degree of interest. A sixth grade, asked to find out if 
gunpowder was used at the battle of Crecy, became so 
engrossed with the problem that the teacher, who had 
at first protested against such work for "poor little 

1 Spanish Explorers in the Southern United States, Original Narratives, 
150. 



RY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 37 1 

minds," a few days later complained that the same 
•or little minds" in their enthusiasm for the gun- 
powder question were neglecting more important work. 
A seventh grade discussing, the last period of the school 
day, the evidence for the Pocahontas story begged to 
have the period extended. The concession was granted 
and the discussion went on until four o'clock — thirty 
minutes of voluntary staying after school. 

But is there not danger of making children skeptical 
beyond their years, unduly wise, and even " bumptious " ? 
Apparently not. The usual lesson which they seem to 
learn is that one must work very hard to find out the 
h about the past. It is besides not at all necessary 
that every look behind a history should open up a con- 
troversy. It is in fact, desirable that some of the 
stories investigated should be found indisputably true. 
The question of how we know requires illustration of 
what we really know as well as of what we ought really 
only to suspect or openly to doubt. 

The general distinction between primary and secon- 
dary sources is easily made. The pupil has but to ask, 
■ .or there, or did he get his information by 
ling or by hearing about the matter? " This directs 
** attention in a simple way to the fact that secondary 
writers now usually cite their authorities. Children 
early show an interest in knowing something about 



372 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the authors of histories and of their methods of work. 
It was a sixth-grade girl who, after looking for certain 
facts in Einhard's Charlemagne and in Emerton's Intro- 
duction to the Middle Ages, wanted to know if Einhard 
and Emerton lived at the same time. A seventh grade 
can be introduced to some of the myste i : of checking 
up a secondary writer. The teacher may read from 
Fiske's Discovery of America: 

The narrative upon which our account of th~ Vinlan.d voyages 
is chiefly based belongs to the class of historic;, sagas. It is the 
Saga of Eric the Red, and it exists in two different versions, of 
which one seems to have been made in the north, the other in the 
west of Iceland. The western version is the earlier and in some 
respects the better. It is found in two vellum-, that of the great 
collection known as Hauksbok (AM. 544), and that which is simply 
known as AM. 557 from its catalogue number. ... Of these the 
former, which is the best preserved, was wri on in a beautiful 
hand by Hauk Erlendsson, between 1305 anc 3 \/\ the year o 
his death. This western version is the one \ hich has generally 
been printed under the title, " Saga of Thorfin I It, Isefni." It is 
the one to which I have most frequently refer : n the present 
chapter. 

The northern version is that which was made abcut the year 
1387 by the priest Jon Thordharson, and contained in the famous 
compilation known as the Flateyar-bdk, or "Flat Island Book." 
This priest was editing the saga of King Olaf Tryggvesson, which 
is contained in that compilation, and inasmuch as I if Ericsson's 
presence at King Olaf's court was connected both with the intro- 
duction of Christianity into Greenland and v 
Vinland, Jon paused, after the manner of n idiaeval chroniclers, 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 373 

and inserted then and there what he knew about Eric and Leif 
and Thorfinn. . . . Jon's version . . . has generally been printed 
under the title, " Saga of Eric the Red. " 1 

The teacher may then read : 

One of the men who accompanied Eric to Greenland was 
named Herjulf, whose son Bjarni, after roving the seas for some 
years, came home to Iceland in 986 to drink the Yuletide ale 
with his father. Finding him gone, he weighed anchor and started 
after him to Greenland, but encountered foggy weather, and sailed 
on for many days by guess-work without seeing sun or stars. 
When at length he sighted land it was a shore without moun- 
tains, showing only small heights covered with dense woods. It 
was evidently not the land of fiords and glaciers for which Bjarni 
was looking. So without stopping to make explorations he turned 
his prow to the north and kept on. The sky was now fair, and 
after scudding nine or ten days with a brisk breeze astern, Bjarni 
saw the icy crags of Greenland looming up before him, and after 
some further searching found his way to his father's new home. 
On the route he more than once sighted land on the larboard. 

The narrative then relates how Leif, the son of Eric 
the Red, "stimulated by what he had heard about 
Bjarni's experiences," went out to explore the lands 
which Bjarni had seen and thus came upon what is now 
supposed to have been our own continent. 2 

Which version has here been followed? The teacher 
reads from the Saga of Thorfinn Karlsefni : 

1 Fiske, Discovery of America, I, 198-199. 

2 Ibid., 162-164. 



374 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Leif went to the court of King Olaf Tryggvason. He was well 
received by the king, who felt that he could see that Leif was a 
man of great accomplishments. Upon one occasion the king 
came to speech with Leif, and asks him, " Is it thy purpose to sail 
to Greenland in the summer?" "It is my purpose," said Leif, 
" if it be your will." " I believe it will be well," answers the king, 
"and thither thou shalt go upon my errand, to proclaim Chris- 
tianity there." Leif replied that the king should decide, but gave 
it as his belief that it would be difficult to carry this mission to a 
successful issue in Greenland. The king replied that he knew of 
no man who would be better fitted for this undertaking, " and in 
thy hands the cause will surely prosper." "This can only be," 
said Leif, "if I enjoy the grace of your protection." Leif put to 
sea when his ship was ready for the voyage. For a long time he 
was tossed about upon the ocean, and came upon lands of which he 
had previously had no knowledge. There were self-sown wheat 
fields and vines growing there. There were also those trees there 
which are called "mausur," and of all these they took specimens. 

Leif eventually reached Greenland and proclaimed 
Christianity. There was "much talk about a voyage of 
exploration to that country which Leif had discovered," 
and Thorstein Ericsson led an expedition to explore 
it. The expedition was, however, unsuccessful. Later 
' ( Karlsef ni and Snorri fitted out their ship, for the pur- 
pose of going in search of that country in the spring. 
Biarni and Thorhall joined the expedition with their 
ship." This expedition was successful and Wineland 
was thus definitely revealed. 1 

1 The Northmen, Columbus, and Cabot, Original Narratives, 25, 26, 31-44- 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 375 

It is at once apparent that this is not the story told in 
the passage cited from Fiske. The teacher turns to 
the other version : 

Biarni arrived with his ship at Eyrar [in Iceland] in the 
summer of the same year, in the spring of which his father had 
sailed away [for Greenland]. Biarni was much surprised when he 
heard this news, and would not discharge his cargo. His ship- 
mates inquired of him what he intended to do, and he replied that 
it was his purpose to keep his custom and make his home for the 
winter with his father; "and I will take the ship to Greenland, if 
you will bear me company." They all replied that they would 
abide by his decision. Then said Biarni, "Our voyage must be 
regarded as foolhardy, seeing that no one of us has ever been in 
the Greenland Sea." Nevertheless they put out to sea when they 
were equipped for the voyage, and sailed for three days, until the 
land was hidden by the water, and then the fair wind died out, 
and north winds arose, and fogs, and they knew not whither they 
were drifting, and thus it lasted for many "dcegr." Then they 
saw the sun again, and were able to determine the quarters of the 
heavens ; they hoisted sail, and sailed that " dcegr" through before 
they saw land. They discussed among themselves what land it 
could be, and Biarni said that he did not believe that it could be 
Greenland. They asked whether he wished to sail to this land or 
not. "It is my counsel," [said he], "to sail close to the land." They 
did so, and soon saw that the land was level and covered with 
woods, and that there were small hillocks upon it." 

As they sailed on they saw land a second and a third 
time, but did not go ashore. When at last they reached 
Greenland and Biarni told of the lands which he had seen, 
" the people thought that he had been lacking in enter- 



376 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

prise, since he had no report to give concerning these coun- 
tries, and the fact brought him reproach." Leif, the son 
of Eric the Red, visited Biarni, bought a ship of him and 
sailed away to explore the land which Biarni had seen. 1 

Here evidently is the version which Fiske has fol- 
lowed. The other, and older of the two versions, is 
regarded by critics as the more probable. Fiske himself 
says that it is the one to which he has "most frequently 
referred." Why, then, does he offer the Flat Island 
Book version? 

The teacher who wishes to test a little further Fiske's 
use of the material may read what is said about Eric's 
lack of interest in Christianity and compare with refer- 
ences to the subject in the sagas. "Eric, it is said," 
writes Fiske, "preferred to go in the way of his fathers, 
and deemed boisterous Valhalla, with its cups of wassail, 
a place of better cheer than the New Jerusalem, with 
its streets of gold." 2 The sagas make no mention of 
"boisterous Valhalla" or the "New Jerusalem." In 
one place it is stated that "Eric was slow in forming the 
determination to forsake his old belief," in another place, 
that he died before the introduction of Christianity, and 
in still another place, that he was actually baptized. 3 

1 The Northmen, Columbus, and Cabot, Original Narratives, 48-50. 

2 Fiske, Discovery of America, I, 163. 

3 Reeves, Finding of Wineland the Good, 36, 57, 69. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 377 

Elementary exercises in putting facts together may be 
of two general kinds. The pupil may be asked to select 
from such facts as have been presented those that can 
be included under a given group name. Or he may be 
given a group of facts and asked to supply an appropri- 
ate group name. Exercises of either kind should suggest 
arrangements different from those already given in class 
or in the textbook. A seventh grade, after learning the 
origin of the name America, may be asked to find the dis- 
coverers of America. Usually they think of only one 
discoverer. The group name, " Discoverers of America," 
will suggest the Norsemen, Columbus, the Cabots, and 
Vespucius, and give a somewhat different significance 
to their achievements. The exercise may be reversed. 
The achievements may be grouped and the class asked 
to supply a name for the group. Such exercises may 
begin as early as the fourth grade, and in the seventh 
and eighth grades may be extended to topics of larger 
scope, illustrating different modes of grouping, the chron- 
ological, the geographical, the logical, and combinations 
of the three. Pupils may be asked to prepare a chro- 
nology of discovery and exploration in America, iooo- 
1565, to group discoverers and explorers with reference 
to their nationality, with reference to the flag which 
they carried, with reference to the territory which 
they discovered or explored, to put together facts 



378 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

illustrative of the relations between white men and 
Indians. 

In the upper grades a beginning may be made also of 
exercises in which pupils consciously apply on their 
own initiative principles of selection and grouping. 
The problem may be to read a brief narrative, or parts 
of several narratives, to pick out the facts that seem to 
be the most important, and to put them together in the 
form of a connected story. Pupils trained to analyze 
and to rearrange their reading in the manner described 
in the chapter on the use of textbooks * may be expected 
to make very acceptable reports on wisely selected 
readings. 

All of the materials to which reference has thus far 
been made can be used also in the high school. They 
will, of course, not be used if the children have already 
worked out the problems in the elementary school. 
The difference is in the treatment. In the elementary 
school the teacher does most of the reading and directs 
attention to the problems by questioning. In the 
high school the pupil may himself do most of the read- 
ing and reach his conclusions with less direct guidance. 

Work in the high school should include written exer- 
cises in which the pupil classifies his material, passes 
judgment upon its value for the topic under discussion, 

1 See above, p. 187. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 379 

and gives specific references. It is well for these pur- 
poses to follow a fixed plan. A regular printed form with 
spaces for required data is convenient and can easily 
be made up to order by any printer. It may be a sepa- 
rate sheet or included on the first page of a folded sheet 
of any size desired. The following is an example : 

Studies in History 

M. (Name of pupil). Subject 

Assigned (Insert date). Report (Insert date). 

Number of pages read. . . Time spent in preparation. . . . 

References 

Sources 

Secondary works 

Personal impression of authors 

Best single reference 

In making assignments to individual pupils the teacher 
writes in the name of the pupil, the subject, the date of 
assignment, and the date for handing in the report. 
For some exercises the teacher indicates also the works 
to be consulted. Where there is to be general class 
discussion the subject should usually be the same for 
all and should be one that lends itself to brief treatment. 
The paper should either have a ruled margin or space 
at the bottom of the sheet for specific references for the 
body of the report. Two or three short papers in which 



380 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the authorities are indicated, and two or three short 
papers and one paper of considerable length in which 
the pupils find their own authorities, will ordinarily be 
sufficient in any one year. 

Subjects for such papers should be so stated as to call 
for definite conclusions. What boundaries were assigned 
to Virginia by the charter of 1609? Why was Roger 
Williams banished from Massachusetts ? Who was the 
author of the Monroe doctrine? When and where did 
Henry Clay say that he would rather be right than be 
president? For the first independent quest for mate- 
rial it is sometimes convenient to assign brief extracts 
from standard works, with instructions to the pupil to 
trace the authority for the facts alleged to primary 
sources, to decide whether the facts are correctly reported 
in the extract assigned, and to describe just how he went 
to work to find his materials. The following are types 
of extracts that have been tested in this way : 

One day Peisistratus appeared in his chariot in the popular 
assembly, covered with blood and alleging that he had been 
attacked and wounded. On the motion of Ariston the people 
resolved with the consent of the council to assign him a guard of 
fifty club men. He obtained more than fifty, and seized the 
citadel. 

At length with great toil and peril Hannibal reached the sum- 
mit, where he rested his men and cheered them with some such 
words as these: "Here on the summit of the Alps, we hold the 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 38 1 

citadel of Italy ; below us on the south are our friends, the Gauls, 
who will supply us with provisions from their bountiful lands and 
will help us against their deadly foes ; and yonder in the distance 
lies Rome." 

[Death and burial of Alaric] Now that their leader had 
died in an enemy's land they [the Germans] outdid themselves in 
showing him honour. They forced their Roman captives to divert 
the current of the river Busento, in order that his grave should 
be undisturbed. Here in the bed of the stream, with rich treasures 
heaped around him, they laid him to rest. The water was turned 
back into its course, and the workmen were slain lest they should 
betray the secret. 

Roger Williams. Born in Wales about 1600 : died in Rhode 
Island, probably, in March or April, 1684. 

[Battle of Crecy.] A small ditch protected the English front, 
and behind it the bowmen were drawn up "in the form of a har- 
row," with small bombards between them "which, with fire, threw 
little iron balls to frighten the horses" — the first instance of the 
use of artillery in field warfare. 

[Inauguration of Jefferson, 1801.] Jefferson had resolved that 
no pageant should give the lie to his democratic principles, and 
accordingly he rode on horseback, clad in studiously plain clothes, 
without attendants, to the capitol, dismounted, tied his horse to 
the fence, and walked unceremoniously into the senate chamber. 

It is sometimes useful to assign work of this kind 
before giving definite instruction and practice in the use 
of indexes, tables of contents, card catalogues, footnotes, 
lists of authorities in histories, bibliographical sugges- 
tions in encyclopedias, and special historical bibliog- 
raphies. The result is likely to convince the pupil of 



382 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the utility of such aids. But the instruction should 
at some time be definitely given and with it sufficient 
practice to insure a reasonable degree of facility. There 
should be special exercises in bibliography and at least 
one of the short papers in each year may be of this 
character. The subject must of course be one on which 
not too much has been written. The pupil may be 
shown a bibliography of Franklin or of Hamilton; he 
could scarcely be expected to make one. The subjects 
must usually be local celebrities not too celebrated, and 
local incidents or questions not too widely heralded, or, 
in the field at large, relatively obscure persons, inci- 
dents, and questions. 

Any work in the high school involving comparisons of 
different accounts should be reduced to a definite system. 
The pupil should do more than read the accounts and 
report his general impressions. He should carefully 
tabulate point by point, either in parallel columns or on 
separate cards, each fact or opinion in the accounts and 
then compare point by point. It is only after careful 
training that impressions gained merely by reading are 
in any way to be depended upon. Many intelligent 
persons overlook striking differences even in dealing 
with very familiar material. Classes made up of teach- 
ers have repeatedly failed, with the materials definitely 
before them, to detect any difference, except in phrase- 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 383 

ology, between the command to keep the Sabbath as 
stated in Deuteronomy v, 12-16, and in Exodus xx, 
8-12. 

The interest of pupils in problems designed to convey 
impressions of what is involved in arriving at the truth 
about the past will be stimulated by occasional reference 
to specific achievements of historical criticism. How 
did Lorenzo Valla prove the donation of Constantine 
a forgery ? * How did Champollion decipher Egyptian 
hieroglyphics ? 2 By what process was the famous story 
that "as the first thousand years of our calendar drew 
to an end, in every land of Europe the people expected 
with certainty the destruction of the world" shown to 
be a mere legend ? 3 How did Professor Dunning prove 
that George Bancroft wrote President Johnson's first 
annual message ? 4 Not only may an account of the 
problem and its solution be presented, but some of the 
steps in the solution may occasionally be taken in class. 
First-year pupils in the high school, knowing how 
Champollion reached the conclusion that a certain group 
of characters made up the name Ptolemy and another 
group the name Cleopatra, will, with the two groups 

1 Coleman, Constantine. the Great and Christianity, 191-199. 

2 Budge, The Mummy, 129-147. 

% American Historical Review, VI, 429-439. 
*Jhid., XI, S74-S83- 



384 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

placed upon the blackboard, themselves readily do a 
little deciphering. The names written in hieroglyphics 
are as follows: 

No. 1. Ptolemy. 



Gi^'W] 




No. 2. Cleopatra. 




'AM*$km<Ki^ 



The class may be asked to pick out the signs which 
are identical in the two groups and compare their 
positions with the letters in the names above each car- 
touche. Thus sign No. 1 in cartouche No. 1 is seen to 
be the same as sign No. 5 in cartouche No. 2. The 
first letter in Ptolemy is P and the fifth letter in Cleo- 
patra is P. What is the natural inference? Before the 
comparison has been completed the class should be told 
that signs 10 and n always accompany feminine names. 

With the characters thus discovered the class may 
examine cartouche No. 3. 

No. 3. 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 385 

Knowing from cartouches Nos. i and 2 the signs 1,2, 
4, 5, 7, and 8 the class may write out the equivalents in 
our own alphabet, leaving blank spaces for the unknown 
characters. They will then readily see how a scholar 
might at once surmise that the cartouche contains the 
name Alexander and that the values of three additional 
signs have been discovered. The teacher need not be 
surprised if, after such a lesson, a demand arises for 
signs sufficient to enable pupils to write their own names 
in hieroglyphics. 1 The exercise in a somewhat simplified 
form has been tried with success even in a sixth grade. 

Exercises in historical construction of the kind sug- 
gested for the elementary school may be continued in 
the high school, with the addition of some illustrations 
of historical organization drawn from the practice of 
historians. The principle of grouping facts according to 
kind and of arranging each kind in chronological order 
can be extended and used with profit as a basis for drill 
and review. The Indian question in the United States, 
the tariff, internal improvements, slavery, the money 
of the United States, and other similar topics, treated 
in this way, should each call up readily a procession of 
dates attended by associations that bring definitely into 
view the main facts relating to each topic so far as de- 
veloped. This plan makes possible a variety of interest- 

1 For materials see Judge, The Mummy, 366-375. 

2C 



, 



386 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ing studies of the relations of facts within a group to 
each other and to facts in other groups, studies which 
give to cause and effect in history a meaning quite 
different from that ordinarily conveyed by a ready-made 
enumeration of cause and effect. 

If the burden imposed upon the memory by learning 
a considerable number of dates is considered too great, 
something similar in character can be accomplished by 
a distribution of topics. At the beginning of the year 
say to A : "I want you to be our specialist on American 
slavery. As the work goes on you are to enter in your 
notebook everything that has any bearing on slavery. 
You are to know definitely the dates, the situations, and 
their relations to other situations. Whenever we are 
in doubt on any question connected with slavery, we shall 
turn to you for information." Say to B : "You are to be 
our specialist on the tariff," and repeat the directions 
given for slavery. It is easy in this way to assign to 
each member of the class some special topic for which 
he is to be individually responsible throughout the year. 
Have the whole class copy all the tables compiled, but 
do not hold all responsible for all the tables. As a part 
of the review of each lesson ask if there are any additions 
to be made to the notebook. If so, have them copied 
then and there. All will find these tables useful in gen- 
eral reviews where general reviews are required. All 



SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 387 

will obtain new light on the relations of facts to each 
other. The plan can be applied in developing the history 
of any country. 

It is quite possible to leave the pupil at the end of his 
high school course with fairly definite impressions of 
history both as a process of establishing and organizing 
truth and as a body of organized truth. It is too much 
to expect to leave him with habits of investigation so 
firmly fixed and with a mind so open to historical evi- 
dence as to insure him against all future lapses from the 
historical treatment of historical data. There are too 
many melancholy examples of failure on the part even 
of highly trained historical specialists to apply the 
principles of historical science to leave room for any such 
pious expectation. It is, however, permissible to hope 
that a tendency may be developed to treat ordinary data 
historical in character with some degree of discrimina- 
tion. It is permissible to hope that a foundation may 
be laid for an intelligent appreciation of histories. It is 
something merely to be protected against the gilded 
historical rubbish so extensively advertised in periodi- 
cals and in special circulars, and so often commended 
by ex officio critics of the class vaguely described by 
book agents as the "best people." The "best people" 
may buy a ten-volume history of the world convinced 
of its enormous erudition by the statement in capital 



388 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

letters that it is " the most scholarly work of its time." 
It must be, for the author spent three whole years in 
preparing it. A graduate from a high school ought to 
know that ten-volume scholarship ranging over such a 
field and three years of preparation are hopelessly 
incompatible. 



CHAPTER XV 

The Correlation of History with Other Subjects 
in the Curriculum 

The correlation of school studies means a treatment 
in which knowledge or discipline derived from one 
subject is brought into connection with knowledge or 
discipline derived from other subjects. It is of two 
general kinds: (i) the incidental correlation which 
springs from a broad view of any subject and is sug- 
gested for the illumination of the subject itself, and 
(2) the systematic correlation which seeks in varying 
degrees to unify the curriculum. 

Incidental correlation is correlation of the kind 
described by the Committee of Seven. "Ideal condi- 
tions," said the Committee, "will prevail when the 
teachers in one field of work are able to take wise ad- 
vantage of what their pupils are doing in another ; when 
the teacher of Latin or Greek will call the attention 
of his pupils, as they read Caesar or Xenophon, to the 
facts which they have learned in their history classes ; 
when the teachers of French and German and English 
will do the same ; when the teacher of physical geography 
389 



r 



390 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

will remember that the earth is man's dwelling place, or 
more properly his growing place, and will be able to re- 
late the mountains, seas, and tides of which he speaks 
with the growth and progress of men ; when he will re- 
member that Marco Polo and Henry the Navigator and 
Meriwether Lewis were unfolding geography and making 
history, and that Cape Verde not only juts out into the 
Atlantic but stands forth as a promontory in- human 
history. Is the time far distant when the march of the 
Ten Thousand will be looked upon not merely as a pro- 
cession of optative moods and conditional clauses, but 
as an account of the great victory won by Greek skill, 
discipline, and intelligence over the helplessness of orien- 
tal confusion ? And will Caesar long be taught only as 
a compound of ablative absolutes and indirect discourses, 
rather than as a story, told by one of history's greatest 
men, of how our Teutonic forefathers were brought face 
to face with Roman power, and how the peoples of Gaul 
were subjected to the arts and the arms of Rome, and 
made to pass under the yoke of bondage to southern 
civilization and southern law ? The teacher of history, 
if he knows the foreign languages which his pupils are 
studying, may connect the words they have learned with 
concrete things ; and he may, above all, help to give the 
young people who are trying to master a foreign tongue, 
some appreciation of the tone, temper, and spirit of 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 39 1 

the people, without which a language seems void and 
characterless." 1 

Incidental correlation was probably introduced by 
the first good teacher and has probably found some 
illustration in the work of good teachers ever since. 
The gain and pleasure to be derived from it scarcely 
need statement. It should, however, be observed that 
the Committee of Seven in discussing the principle 
employed the future tense. There was apparently need 
in 1899 of directing the attention of teachers in general to 
rather obvious possibilities, and there is still need of 
emphasis. 

Systematic correlation not only looks to the indi- 
vidual teacher to take advantage in each field of what 
pupils are doing in other fields, but plans definitely in 
advance to have pupils constantly dealing in each field 
with material bearing upon material in other fields. 
Comenius had the idea. Jacatot expressed it in his 
paradox, "All is in all," and in the corollary, "Know one 
thing thoroughly and relate everything else to that." 
Herbart led up to it in his conception of apperception 
as the assimilation of a new idea by ideas already in the 
mind. The principle, chiefly through the influence of 
Herbartians, began to be applied in the United States 

about forty years ago, and by 1890 had come to occupy 
I 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 30-32. 



392 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

a leading place in educational discussions. The early 
nineties resounded with concrete examples of close 
correlation. A supervisor of elementary instruction 
discovered that history could be introduced into arith- 
metic and arithmetic into history by computing the 
difference between the number of British and the num- 
ber of colonial casualties at Bunker Hill. A superin- 
tendent of schools discovered an intimate connection 
between the hanging of two murderers in an adjoining 
county and the subjects in the school curriculum. A 
newspaper editorial on the hanging served, it was said, 
as a lesson in reading. A class in civics debated the 
question of capital punishment. A class in history com- 
pared the crimes punishable by death in England in the 
seventeenth century with crimes punishable by death 
in the United States in the latter part of the nineteenth 
century. A class in arithmetic computed the board 
feet of lumber in the scaffold. A class in physics calcu- 
lated the tension of the rope. The principle seemed to 
admit of limitless application. Might not to-day's 
lesson in arithmetic be, not merely one growing out of 
yesterday's lesson in arithmetic and leading up to the 
arithmetic lesson of to-morrow, but one growing out 
of yesterday's lesson in arithmetic, geography, nature 
study, drawing, current events, and even history and 
literature, and leading up to the lessons of to-morrow in 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 393 

all of these lines? Might not lessons in each subject 
be planned in this way with definite reference to lessons 
in other subjects? 

The ideal may appear attractive, but there are great 
practical difficulties. The special school studies, as 
ordinarily conceived, do not offer in sufficient number 
the necessary points of contact. To force relations is 
to develop views often superficial and sometimes gro- 
tesque. Any high degree of systematic correlation 
seems to require either that all knowledge desirable for 
school purposes be thrown into one general mass and 
then reorganized without reference to the "artificial 
lines" created by the growth of special studies, or else 
that some one subject or line of interest be selected as 
a center or core about which to group materials from 
other subjects. The most notable achievements in 
close correlation have been of the latter sort. Ziller, 
a follower of Herbart, chose history as the central sub- 
ject and built around it, for the elementary school, a 
course of study based upon the culture-epoch theory. 
Among other subjects and lines of interest that have 
at various times been used as the organizing core are 
general science, geography, and the social life of the 
school. This is what is commonly called concentration. 
It is unnecessary for the present purpose to examine in 
detail such comprehensive schemes of correlation. The 



394 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

conditions will be sufficiently illustrated by a brief 
consideration of the relations between history and 
geography, history and literature, and history and 
government. 

The theater of events is a necessary part of their 
reality. It is in many cases the cause that produced 
them. Man makes his physical environment. He is 
also made by his physical environment. The story of 
his life is in any case inseparable from his physical en- 
vironment. Geography describes this environment. 
It must, in describing it, include the works of man. 
History without geography and geography without 
history are alike unthinkable. School courses in the 
two fields would, therefore, seem naturally to invite 
correlation. 

The situation has been clearly recognized and con- 
sciously faced in the making of programs for European 
elementary schools. The German pupil commonly 
begins with realien, sl blending of geography, history, 
and general science. From object lessons connected 
with the teaching of language he is gradually led to home 
geography, local traditions, and nature study. Geog- 
raphy and history, on becoming separate subjects, go 
hand in hand as he passes from the district to the prov- 
ince and on to the Empire. Beyond the Empire the 
subjects necessarily draw apart. History is essentially 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 395 

German history. Geography takes a wider survey 
The French elementary program keeps the topics in 
history and geography related in a general way through- 
out the course. History, in the upper classes, passes 
from a review of French history to summary notions of 
ancient, mediaeval and modern history, and of current 
events. Geography, in the upper classes, passes from 
Europe to the world at large. 

European secondary schools, like European elementary 
schools, provide instruction in the two subjects through- 
out the whole or most of the course. Secondary school 
programs show, however, in general less attention to 
correlation than elementary school programs. Some 
programs for secondary schools in Germany arrange to 
have countries treated in the history course treated at 
about the same time in the geography course. The 
relations are further emphasized by the general prac- 
tice of assigning to the same teacher classes both in 
geography and in history. In programs of the concen- 
tration type, with history as the central subject, the cor- 
relation reaches even individual topics in individual 
lessons. But, in the main, the history course is planned 
for history and the geography course for geography. 
This is true in a still higher degree in France. The 
ancient custom of intrusting the two subjects to the same 
teacher remains, but even that has been severely criti- 



396 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

cised. "In France," writes M. Langlois, "geography- 
has long been regarded as a science closely related to 
history. An Agregation, which combines history and 
geography, exists at the present day, and in the lycees 
history and geography are taught by the same pro- 
fessors. Many people persist in asserting the legiti- 
macy of this combination, and even take umbrage when 
it is proposed to separate two branches of knowledge 
united, as they say, by many essential connecting links. 
But it would be hard to find any good reason, or any 
facts of experience, to prove that a professor of history 
or an historian is so much the better the more he knows 
of geology, oceanography, climatology, and the whole 
group of geographical sciences. In fact it is with some 
impatience, and to no immediate advantage, that the 
students of history work through the courses of geog- 
raphy which their curricula force upon them; and 
those students who have a real taste for geography 
would be very glad to throw history overboard. The 
artificial union of history with geography dates back, 
in France, to an epoch when geography was an ill-de- 
fined and ill-arranged subject, regarded by all as a negli- 
gible branch of study. It is a relic of antiquity that 
we ought to get rid of at once." 1 

1 Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to the Study of History, 46-47, 
Note. 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 397 

In the majority of American schools little history 
is taught below the seventh grade, and in the upper 
grades the subject is usually American history. In 
the high school, geography is scarcely taught at all. 
The opportunities for correlation are in consequence, 
for most schools, so limited that they scarcely suggest 
a practical problem. With more history in the elemen- 
tary school and more geography in the high school, 
general correlation of the kind worked out in the French 
elementary program and in some German secondary 
programs would appear to be desirable. But for the 
most part European experience seems to indicate that 
the place to emphasize the geographical background of 
history is in the history course, and that the place to 
emphasize the historical background of geography is 
in the geography course. At best, the geography needed 
to illuminate history may or may not be the geography 
needed to illuminate geography, and the history needed 
to illuminate geography may or may not be the history 
needed to illuminate history. 

The correlation of history and literature presents a 
somewhat different problem. History began as a branch 
of literature, and history conceived in the literary spirit 
continues to find publishers and readers. The line of 
demarcation which critical historians have been drawing 
during the last hundred years, and which is now fairly 



398 TEACHING OF HISTOR"? 

clear to special students of history, has to some extent 
been recognized in the shaping of school programs. 
But the attitude of a very considerable part of the edu- 
cational world has from the first been unfriendly toward 
all attempts to sever history from its literary asso- 
ciations. 

Jacob Grimm, a century ago, complained that educa- 
tion had created an unnatural gulf between history 
and poetry, and this is still the opinion of many writers 
on education. There are, as we have seen, theories of 
grading history that require a romantic treatment of 
the subject even in the high school. There are educa- 
tional aims that point to history as an "epic, a drama, 
and a song." There are conceptions of historical truth 
that place the tales of poets above the sober facts nar- 
rated by historians. In many cases, therefore, the cor- 
relation of history and literature means the treatment of 
history itself in the literary spirit and, in some cases, 
the treatment of history itself for the sake of literature. 
"Most people," argued a prominent speaker, discussing, 
some years ago, the aims of history teaching, "in think- 
ing of Lexington and Concord, think of Paul Revere' 's 
Ride. The poem should, then, be taught, not only 
because it is eminently suitable for school use, but be- 
cause children made familiar with it are to that extent 
brought into harmony with their environment outside 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 399 

of school." "Why," asked another speaker on a simi- 
lar occasion, "should we teach the events of April 19, 
1775?" "Chiefly," was the answer, "in order that 
children may understand Paul Revere's Ride." 

Advocates of the correlation that ends by swamping 
history in literature have a simple task. Literature 
abounds in portrayals of scenes and characters, great 
and small, by poets, dramatists, and novelists. The 
materials have so often been searched out and listed 
that no great amount of ingenuity is required to discover 
them. It is easy to fill the history course with such 
materials and to correlate with similar materials in read- 
ing courses and in studies in literature. It is easy, if 
there are qualms of historical conscience, to point out 
general distinctions between history and literature and 
easy to preserve peaceful relations afterward by a little 
honest lapse of memory in applying the distinctions, or 
by a little honest ignorance of history. But difficulties 
of a somewhat serious character await those who really 
explore the mutual contributions of the two fields. " His- 
tory," we read, for example, "is the record of men's 
deeds. Literature is the record of men's thoughts and 
feelings. How can one record be understood without 
reading the other also? Indeed, it is only by bringing 
the two records together and comparing them — in- 
terpreting men's feelings in the light of their deeds, 



400 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

and illustrating their deeds by their sentiments and 
feelings as they are expressed in literature — that the 
study of either literature or history can be made vital." * 
History does not, of course, stop with men's deeds, and 
literature does not stop with men's thoughts and feel- 
ings. History habitually includes thoughts and feel- 
ings ; literature does not hesitate to describe deeds. A 
considerable part of the literature used in school to 
illuminate history is, indeed, almost pure narration of 
events. But, waiving this objection, and admitting that 
the two records should be brought together and com- 
pared, other difficulties appear. The speaker who found 
in Paul Revere [s Ride a reason for studying history would, 
in all probability, have been less sure of his ground if his 
logic had carried him to the actual test. It would seem 
at least of doubtful value, either to history or to liter- 
ature, before or after galloping with Paul Revere into 
"Concord town" in Longfellow's spirited poem, to be 
stopped on the road by British soldiers in some cold 
history, with no hint that "the fate of a nation" was 
thus dismounted or that the steed was responsible for a 
"spark" which "kindled the land into flame with its 
heat." A good poem or novel may be quite spoiled by 
a little consideration of the bald facts and their historical 

1 Report, Association of History Teachers of the Middle States and 
Maryland, 1908, p. 50. 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 401 

significance. A clear page of history may reap only 
confusion from romance. 

It is of course possible to select, both from contempo- 
rary literature and from later literary reconstructions of 
the past, records that need not be questioned. The 
object may be merely to illustrate the sentiments of 
individual authors. The record may be one in which 
the facts of history are touched but lightly, or in a very 
general way, and as a mere background, with emphasis 
upon impressions made by the facts or upon their larger 
meaning. One does not check severely Byron's sum- 
mary of Greek history in the Isles of Greece, or the con- 
versation between the mate and the admiral in Joaquin 
Miller's Sail On. One does not look to Browning's Abt 
Vogler or A Grammarian's Funeral for biography. The 
situation is in any event saved, in most cases, by the 
simple device of not bringing the two records together 
for comparison. Those who look upon Ivanhoe as "a 
true picture of the Middle Ages," or A Tale of Two Cities 
as "a true picture of the French Revolution," naturally 
feel no need of instituting comparisons. Those who are 
more critical, and who recommend such works for "purely 
illustrative purposes," usually find comparisons with 
matter of fact pictures impracticable. For teachers in 
general it is enough that historical fiction is supposed to 
be more interesting than history, that it is supposed to 



402 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

have more atmosphere, and that it is supposed to lead 
in time to the reading of serious history. Lady Clarinda 
spoke for a large class of readers. " History," she said, 
"is but a tiresome thing in itself; it becomes the more 
agreeable the more romance is mixed up with it. The 
great enchanter has made me learn many things which 
I should never have dreamed of studying, if they had 
not come to me in the form of amusement." 1 

The romantic treatment of history has been com- 
mended even by historians. Thierry eulogized Cha- 
teaubriand and contrasted Scott's "wonderful compre- 
/hension of the past with the petty erudition of the most 
celebrated modern historians." The appearance of 
Ivanhoe he saluted "with transports of enthusiasm." 
It was apparently from Scott that he derived the inspi- 
ration for his Conquest of England by the Normans, and it 
was quite in the spirit of Scott that he wrote at the end 
of one of his chapters: "These men have been dead 
seven hundred years. But what of that? For the 
imagination there is no past." 2 

If the discredit cast upon Thierry by historical critics 
is held to detract from the value of his praise, we have, 
nearer home, the generous recognition accorded by James 

1 Thomas Love Peacock, Crotchet Castle, Scribner's Edition, 427. 
("The great enchanter" was of course Sir Walter Scott.) 

1 Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century , 170, 171. 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 403 

Ford Rhodes to a novelist within a field already investi- 
gated by the historian. "What I have attempted in 
the way of color when touching upon South Carolina 
and Charleston," says Rhodes, "has been completely and 
artistically done by Owen Wister in 'Lady Baltimore.' 
Every student of the South during the period of re- 
construction will have his knowledge clarified and his 
judgment informed by a study of this delicate portrayal 
of the people of Charleston. Through the charm of a 
skillfully constructed story, he will be made to see life 
as it is and as it was. Nothing, in my judgment, has 
been written to prove so powerful an agent in bringing 
to pass Lamar's noble words, 'My countrymen, know 
one another and you will love one another.'" * 

Other historians have been less favorably impressed 
by historical fiction. It was no less a master than Ranke 
who declared that "the discovery of the difference in 
the portraits of Louis XI and Charles the Bold in Quen- 
tin Durward and in Commines constituted an epoch in 
his life." "I found by comparison," he says, "that the 
truth was more interesting and beautiful than the ro- 
mance. I turned away from it and resolved to avoid all 
invention and imagination in my work and to stick to 
the facts." 2 

1 History of the United States from the Compromise of 1850, VI, p. vii. 
1 Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, 78. 



404 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

It would be easy to multiply quotations from histo- 
rians in praise or dispraise of historical fiction. It would 
be easy to show similar differences of opinion among 
literary critics, and even among novelists themselves. 1 
The teacher who desires to prove either side by citations 
of opinion will find no lack of distinguished support. 

Accuracy in historical detail is rarely claimed for histori- 
cal novels and rarely tested in school, and the encomiums 
pronounced upon atmosphere come so often from those 
who have scarcely looked at history, outside of a text- 
book, that the claims are subject to some suspicion. 
There should at least be a distinction between an atmos- 
phere really true to history and an atmosphere which 
appears true to the reader merely because he feels atmos- 
phere. The extent to which historical novels cultivate 
a taste for history is debatable. It will not do to argue 
that, because Parkman was led by Cooper's novels to 
write one of the greatest of American histories, the pupil 
who begins with Cooper will end with Parkman. It is 
safer, as a general proposition, to argue that the historical 
novel cultivates a taste for the historical novel. Cer- 
tainly tests of teachers addicted to historical novels show 
an almost hopeless mortality in crossing the bridge to 
history. At bottom, the argument for the introduction 

1 For examples of literary opinion see Forum, XXIV, 79-91, and 
Andr6 Le Breton, Balzac, 83. 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 405 

of historical fiction into school instruction in history- 
rests, in most cases, upon the grounds stated by Lady 
Clarinda. Historical fiction is used because it is inter- 
esting. To a large extent literature in general is used 
for the same and for no other real reason. 

Teachers of history, especially in the elementary 
school, concede too readily that history is "but a tire- 
some thing in itself." The tradition, it should be re- 
membered, has in the main been established by those 
who are more familiar with literary than with historical 
interpretations of history. Those who have tried the 
latter have often discovered, even in the elementary 
school, that there are children who, like Ranke, find 
"the truth more interesting and beautiful than the 
romance." But even if the greater interest of the lit- 
erary interpretation be granted, it does not follow that 
the place of history is in the camp of literature whenever 
it happens to meet a poet, dramatist, or novelist, who 
has drawn materials from its highways or byways. 

History contributes to literature. It furnishes material 
and inspiration to literary genius. It supplies the back- 
ground of conditions and events contemporary with 
literary genius and here, as elsewhere, relates the times 
to the man. It records great achievements in literature 
with great achievements in other fields of human activ- 
ity. It is itself in some cases literature. Literature 



406 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

contributes to history. It furnishes indications of pop- 
ular taste and of moral and intellectual standards. It 
sheds light upon the prejudices, the ideals, and the 
aspirations of a people. It is to be counted with the 
forces that mold the life of a people. It is a part of the 
atmosphere of its age. Each field is dependent upon 
the other. But history moves primarily in the realm of 
fact. Literature moves primarily in the realm of art. 
The difference is radical both in spirit and in purpose. 
It may be that literature is of the higher value to human- 
ity. The value of history is not, in any event, to be 
realized by teaching literature. The duty of those who 
profess to teach history is to teach history. 

The relations between history and government have, 
through most of the history of history, been so intimate 
that to discuss them is much like discussing the relation 
of botany to plants or of zoology to animals. When 
Freeman pronounced history past politics he summed 
up at least the common practice of past historians. 
History meant for centuries essentially the history of 
rulers and of governmental operations, and affairs of 
state still occupy the most prominent place in the pages 
of the general historian. The study of history in school 
has been from the beginning, in large part, a study of 
forms of government, of changes in government, and of 
the workings of government. Partly as cause and partly 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 407 

as effect of this arrangement, it has for many years been 
an axiom that the study of history should prepare for 
political duties. It has for many years been assumed 
that history accomplishes the purpose. 

In Europe the correlation, if the term is here appli- 
cable, has been and is so complete that government 
is commonly taught as a part of the course in history. 
The need of more political instruction has often been 
emphasized, but almost invariably as a part of instruc- 
tion in history. It is a need that has recently found 
frequent expression, especially in Germany. Vergang- 
enheit und Gegenwart, in its initial number in 191 1, pub- 
lished the opinions of six prominent German statesmen. 
Prince Btilow, one of the contributors, quoted a remark 
made by Dr. Althoff in response to a suggestion that 
political instruction in Germany left much to be desired. 
"We are," said Dr. Althoff, "the first people in philos- 
ophy, music, lyric poetry. No one surpasses us in 
bravery before the enemy. In science and in technics, 
in trade and industry we have made mighty progress. 
Since one cannot at the same time do and be everything 
it need not surprise your Highness if we are political 
donkeys." 1 Prince Biilow, without going as far as Dr. 
Althoff, recognized a serious defect in school instruction, 
isvhich he proposed to remedy by making political intel- 
1 Heft 1, 5. 



. 



i 



408 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ligence and a sense of political duty the first aim in the 
teaching of history. This seems to be at present a view 
widely held in Europe. 

In the United States, opinion has to a considerable 
extent followed the conclusions of the Committee of 
Seven. "Much time" said the Committee, "will be 
saved and better results obtained if history and civil 
government be studied in large measure together, as one 
subject rather than as two distinct subjects. We are 
sure that, in the light of what has been said in the earlier 
portions of this report about the desirability of school 
pupils knowing their political surroundings and duties, 
no one will suppose that in what we recommend we under- 
estimate the value of civil government or wish to lessen 
the effectiveness of the study. What we desire to em- 
phasize is the fact that the two subjects are in some 
respects one, and that there is a distinct loss of energy 
in studying a small book on American history and 
afterward a small book on civil government, or vice 
versa, when by combining the two a substantial course 
may be given. 

"In any complete and thorough secondary course in 
these subjects there must be, probably, a separate 
study of civil government, in which may be discussed 
such topics as municipal government, state institutions, 
the nature and origin of civil society, some fundamental 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 409 

notions of law and justice, and like matters ; and it may 
even be necessary, if the teacher desires to give a com- 
plete course and can command the time, to supplement 
work in American history with a formal study of the Con- 
stitution and the workings of the national government. 
But we repeat that a great deal of what is commonly 
called civil government can best be studied as a part of 
history. To know the present form of our constitutions 
well, one should see whence they came and how they 
developed ; but to show origins, developments, changes, 
is the task of history, and in the proper study of history 
one sees just these movements and knows their results." 1 
In 1908, however, a committee of five of the American 
Political Science Association reported that "the con- 
sensus of opinion and the existing practice are clearly 
in favor of teaching American government as a distinct 
branch of high school study," and proceeded with vigor 
to assail the position of teachers who still believed that 
American government should be taught in the course 
in American history. The arguments for the latter ar- 
rangement, as summarized by the Committee, were : 

1. Since American government is largely an outgrowth of 
American history, both should be studied simultaneously. 2. The 
subjects should be taught together to save time and avoid the 
repetition of history. 3. The subject of government when taught 

1 Report, Committee of Seven, 81-82. 



4IO TEACHING OF HISTORY 

apart from history is abstract and very general, therefore unin- 
teresting to high school students. 4. Because of the recommenda- 
tion made by the Committee of Seven of the American Historical 
Association. 

In answer to these arguments the political science 
Committee found in the first statement a "pedagogical 
fallacy." "It does not follow that because government 
is largely an outgrowth from history a boy in the high 
school should study them at the same time." The sec- 
ond statement was declared to be its own best refuta- 
tion. If there is not room for government, there ought 
to be room. As for the repetition of history in the study 
of government, "it is exactly this kind of correlation that 
we want." The third statement was held to be "really 
directed against the threadbare stuff that formerly was 
taught under the meaningless name of 'Civics'" and 
therefore without special significance. The conclusions 
of the Committee of Seven were found "hesitating and 
apparently contradictory." That Committee, it was 
inferred, "did not aim to solve the problem of the course 
in government, but undertook to adapt it to the needs of 
instruction in history." The results of combining the 
two subjects were described. "In most instances the 
teachers present, in these combination courses, American 
history as it is commonly taught, with a brief study of 
local government in connection with the history of the 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 4II 

colonies, a few lessons on the Constitution in the consti- 
tution-making period, and then some hurried lessons here 
and there on special topics like the Speaker, the veto 
power, etc." " We cannot hope," added the Committee, 
"for anything but the merest botch work from such plans 
of instruction." ! 

The Committee of Five of the American Historical 
Association restated the views of the Committee of Seven 
and expressed general sympathy therewith, but, recogniz- 
ing more definitely the need of some separate work in 
government, proposed to divide between history and 
government the time allotted to history in the fourth 
year of the high school. "Two-fifths of the time," said 
the Committee, "may be given to separate work in gov- 
ernment and three-fifths to the course in history. This 
arrangement will not appear to all teachers as ideal ; 
some teachers will desire more time for history, others 
more time for government. But on the whole the dis- 
tribution appears to be the best that can be proposed, 
and we should be the last to assert that no teacher should 
modify any adjustment or arrangement to suit his own 
needs and inclinations, if they are based on an intelligent 
regard for the subject and his pupils. Many teachers 
will prefer to give the civil government separately after 

1 Proceedings, American Political Science Association, 1908, p. 228, 
231, 232, 234, 236, 238. 



412 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

the history work is concluded. But while this plan may 
have its advantages in some respects, the continuous 
study of government throughout the year side by side 
with history has also advantages that merit some con- 
sideration. Where the study of government extends 
through the whole year, there are many opportunities 
for concrete illustrations and even learning by observa- 
tion, which are not allowed in a shorter time : elections 
are held; municipal problems arise and are discussed 
in the newspapers; important appointments to office 
are announced ; the usual presidential message appears. 
These advantages will induce many teachers to prefer 
the system of carrying government through the year 
side by side with history." * 

The conceptions of history and of history teaching 
which have been especially emphasized in these pages are, 
it is at once apparent, quite irreconcilable with any 
general scheme of close correlation except the concentra- 

1 Report, Committee of Five, 52-53. 

The writer is strongly of the opinion that government should be 
taught as a separate subject both in the elementary and in the second- 
ary school. It is for this reason that the teaching of government has 
not been included in the present work. The thread of governmental 
institutions about which school history is still commonly organized is a 
part of history and as such in no need of special discussion. But govern- 
ment as a separate and systematic study of political institutions and 
present civic life offers problems that require for their elucidation a 
separate treatise. 



CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER SUBJECTS 413 

tion about history of all the materials in the curriculum. 
History is not without claims to such a position. It 
is, as suggested by the Committee of Seven, by its very 
nature a central subject. The specialist in every field 
now views his field historically, and the teacher of any 
subject is to some extent called upon to follow the ex- 
ample of the specialist. "As a theoretical proposition, 
at least," said the Committee of Seven, "the assertion 
that the story of life and the onward movement of men, 
not their language or their physical environment, should 
form the center of a liberal course, would seem to leave 
little ground for argument." x Yet concentration about 
history would, perhaps, be as undesirable for history 
as for the subjects thus subordinated to history. Each 
subject presents facts and processes essential to the 
understanding or appreciation of the world as it is, 
which, to be made effective, must be worked out on the 
principle "This one thing I do," and with materials 
selected with an eye single to the one thing. There are, 
beyond question, natural points of contact that should 
be foreseen in planning the curriculum and consciously 
turned to account by all teachers. But it is at best a 
doubtful procedure so to manipulate any subject as to 
impair the integrity of its own peculiar contribution. 
1 Report, Committee of Seven, 32. 



CHAPTER XVI 

The History Examination 

School examinations occasionally involve tests of 
tastes, interests, and habits. More commonly they are 
confined to tests of what pupils know and of what they 
are able to do with what they know. To the extent that 
such processes are involved, every school lesson is an 
examination. More specifically an examination is the 
formal and more or less formidable test which most 
pupils at some stage of their school career learn to ex- 
pect at the end of the month, the term, the year, or the 
course. The latter is the usual conception and is the 
one to be considered in the present chapter. 

The examination idea, as developed in Europe and 
America, had its origin in the universities of the Middle 
Ages, where it was applied in testing candidates for 
admission to the various university degrees. It appears 
to have been first carried over into school practice for the 
purpose of indicating to outside authorities the quality 
of school work. Early school examinations were oral 
and were conducted by bishops and other learned men. 
Such were the "school visitations" of the sixteenth cen- 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 4 1 5 

tury. The step to written examinations conducted by 
teachers in the school appears to have been taken partly 
as a matter of convenience, partly to meet the objection 
that examinations by strangers placed both teachers 
and pupils at a disadvantage, and partly as the expres- 
sion of a growing confidence in teachers. In the case of 
the Merchant Taylors' School in London, the last two 
of these reasons were specifically alleged when, after 
forty years of visitation, provision was made in 1601 
for introducing written examinations to be set by the 
masters, and for confining the work of visitors to a review 
of the papers. 1 Another purpose that early came into 
view in England was the award of scholarships on the 
basis of examination results. Our own vexed question 
of college entrance examinations was launched in 1642, 
when Harvard first formulated its requirements. Be- 
fore the end of the eighteenth century most of the pur- 
poses and problems now commonly associated with school 
examinations had been disclosed. The nineteenth cen- 
tury added few new elements, but extended the applica- 
tion of the examination idea far beyond all earlier prac- 
tice and perfected the machinery of examinations. The 
period of greatest development in the United States was 
ushered in about forty years ago. 
The experience of the sixteenth century brought into 

1 Monroe, Cyclopedia of Education, II, 533-534. 



416 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

discussion two fundamental questions of procedure : 
Shall examinations be determined within or without the 
schools ? Shall they be written or oral ? To these ques- 
tions different countries have returned somewhat differ- 
ent answers. The most important European school 
examination is the leaving examination at the end of 
the secondary school course. Under the Prussian sys- 
tem, established in 1788, there are written examinations 
extending over four or five days and, for those whose 
papers are not entirely satisfactory, supplementary oral 
examinations. The examination board consists of a 
government inspector, the head of the school, and the 
upper class teachers. The questions for the written 
examinations are selected by the inspector from lists 
prepared by the teachers. The papers are marked by 
the teachers concerned and then submitted to the board 
as a whole. The French baccalaureat de V enseignement 
secondaire is the outgrowth of a system established in 
1808. The regulations, as revised in 1902, require ex- 
aminations on the subjects pursued during the second 
cycle. The examinations are in two parts, separated by 
an interval of a year. For some subjects the examina- 
tions are in part written and in part oral ; for others the 
examinations are entirely oral. The examining board 
consists of two or more members of university faculties 
and two or more secondary teachers either active or re- 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 417 

tired. These two systems are typical of the practice of 
continental Europe. 1 

The examinations most familiar in the United States 
are examinations to test at short intervals the progress 
of pupils, and examinations to determine fitness for pro- 
motion, for a school certificate or diploma, or for entrance 
to college. Examinations to test progress are usually 
framed and conducted by class teachers in consultation 
with the principal of the school. Other examinations 
are sometimes determined within the school and some- 
times by state, or college, or other authorities outside 
of the school. The examinations most widely known are 
those conducted by the College Entrance Examination 
Board, organized in 1900, and pronounced by Presi- 
dent Butler in 1913 "by far the most useful single con- 
structive force that has ever come into the field of 
American secondary and collegiate education." 2 The 
Board represents both colleges and secondary schools, and 
both have a voice in the framing of questions and in the 
marking of papers. Examinations are held at different 
centers throughout the country, and in foreign coun- 
tries, and successful candidates are admitted to colleges 
throughout the country. 

The examinations most frequently under discussion 

1 See article on Examinations, Encyclopaedia Britannica, nth edition. 

2 College Entrance Examination Board, Report, 1914, p. 3. 



418 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

are those determined in whole or in part by outside au- 
thorities. Where such examinations are required the 
natural tendency on the part both of teachers and of 
pupils is to prepare for examinations, and even to look 
upon examinations as the chief end of study. This is 
by no means an unmixed evil. It has, indeed, been an 
important factor in elevating standards and a power- 
ful, if not altogether worthy, stimulus to effort on the 
part of pupils. The problem is so to adjust the examina- 
tions as not to interfere with purposes which may be 
considered of higher merit than the attainment of passing 
grades. It is, as suggested by the Madison Conference, to 
devise some system "by which schools which use proper 
methods shall have some advantage." x Under European 
systems of school organization such adjustments are 
relatively simple. The curriculum determines the nature 
of the examinations. Under English and American sys- 
tems the examinations often determine, if not the curric- 
ulum, at least the general methods of teaching. 

Some subjects lend themselves readily to examination. 
The ability, for example, to read Latin, or to solve a 
problem in Algebra, can be definitely and adequately 
tested. The subject of examination is in each case a 
process. Where the subject of an examination is not 
a process, but a body of facts, and where the test of 

1 Report, Committee of Ten, 183. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 419 

ability resolves itself largely into a test of ability to re- 
member, the results may or may not furnish true indica- 
tions of the actual attainments of pupils. This has from 
the beginning been the situation for history. Examiners 
have for years wrestled with the problem of introducing 
"thought" questions. They have asked for comparison 
and inference, for causes and results. They have en- 
deavored to test the ability to select from a mass of facts 
the essentials, to arrange them in orderly form, to deter- 
mine their bearing on present-day problems. They have 
raised questions on collateral reading designed to test 
both knowledge and taste. Efforts in these directions 
are obviously more likely to prove effective in oral 
than in written examinations, and history under the 
Prussian and French systems is, as a matter of fact, 
listed with the subjects in which examinations are ex- 
clusively oral. But the history examination, whether 
oral or written, seems to remain essentially an exercise 
for the memory. Certainly little more can be claimed 
for it in its written form in England and in the United 
States. Here, for example, is a typical examination set 
in England for pupils of about the age of American pupils 
in the third year of the high school : 



[Candidates are required to attempt at least one question in each 
section of the paper, and not more than six altogether.] 



( 



420 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

A 

i. Trace the history of the divorce of Catharine of Aragon 
and show how it affected the separation from Rome. 

2. Write short narratives of (a) Wyatt's Rebellion, (b) the 
loss of Calais. 

3. Give a rapid sketch of English literature under Elizabeth. 

B 

4. Explain the royalist successes in the first two years of the 
Great Rebellion (1642, 1643). Why were they not maintained? 

5. What were the objects aimed at by the Navigation Acts? 
What results were achieved ? 

6. Give some account of the doings of the English navy during 

the reign of William III. 

C 

7. Sketch the relations between England and Spain during 
the eighteenth century. 

8. Give some account of the opposition to Sir Robert Walpole, 
and of the careers of the leaders of that opposition. 

9. Trace in outline the principal stages in the French Revolu- 
tion from its outbreak in 1789 to the establishment of the French 

Empire in 1804. 

D 

10. Write a brief description of the following battles, and 
show their importance : Vinegar Hill, Vittoria, Navarino, Isandh- 
lwana. 

11. Outline, with brief comments, the repressive measures of 
1 81 9 (the six Acts). 

12. How did (a) the coup d'etat of 185 1, (b) the Crimean winter, 
affect the constitution of the British Ministry for the time being ? * 

1 This list of questions is taken from Keatinge, Studies in the Teach- 
ing of History, 173. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 421 

This examination covered the period from 1485 to the 
death of Queen Victoria. 

The following questions, set by the College Entrance 
Examination Board in 19 14, may be taken as fairly 
representative of recent American practice: 

HISTORY C — ENGLISH HISTORY 

In each answer give dates. 

In your answer to at least one question mention authors 
and titles of any books which you have used, in addition to 
your textbook, on the general subject referred to in the 
question or on some phase of that subject. In your answer 
to the question selected, include results of your reading out- 
side the textbook. Indicate the nature or content of one 
book other than your textbook and point out how the book 
has helped you. 

Group I. (Answer one question only.) 

1. Name three great churchmen of England living before 
121 5, who were also great statesmen. Describe carefully the 
work of one of them. 

2. Show that you have a definite knowledge of five of the fol- 
lowing, writing not less than four or five lines on each : Consti- 
tutions of Clarendon, Cade's Rebellion, Curia Regis, Joan of 
Arc, Lollard, Statute of Praemunire, Wars of the Roses. 

Group II. (Answer one question only.) 

3. "The Petition of Right, the Habeas Corpus Act, and the 
Bill of Rights are the complements or the reassertions of the 
Magna Charta." Give the main provisions of each of these 
documents and then explain what the quotation means. 



422 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

4. Name four prominent literary men in the Age of Elizabeth 
and the most famous works of each. Indicate briefly the nature 
or content of one of these works which you have read. 

Group III. (Answer one question only.) 

5. It has been said that "the defeat of the British at York- 
town had a profound effect upon the constitutional development 
of Great Britain herself." Explain this statement. 

6. In what respect is England's present treatment of her 
colonies different from that of the period 1763-1775? 

Group IV. (Answer three questions only.) 

7. Write fully on one of the following : Duke of Marlborough, 
John Bright, Robert Peel. 

8. What was Burke's attitude toward the American Revolu- 
tion? What "source" have you for your knowledge? What 
was Burke's attitude toward the French Revolution? 

9. Why was the Reform Bill of 1832 necessary? Give an 
account of its provisions. 

10. State the provisions of the important measures for Ireland's 
relief advocated by Gladstone. 

11. Indicate briefly how England got control of Australia. 
What is included in the Australian Commonwealth? What are 
the main features of its constitution? 

Group V. (Answer one question only.) 

12. On map 816 indicate with names, and boundaries or loca- 
tions, the possessions which England gained in the eighteenth 
century. 

13. On map 81& indicate with names, and locations or boun- 
daries, the possessions of Great Britain on the way from England 
to India. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 423 

See that you have followed the direction at the head of 
the paper regarding dates and collateral reading. 1 

All of the questions, except 6 and 7, in the English 
paper, are answered directly in the ordinary textbooks 
and involve no necessary mental process beyond memory. 
Questions 6 and 7 seem to suggest something more. 
The facts are not in the ordinary textbooks. Question 
7 would appear to require some power of selection and 
arrangement, even if collateral reading is assumed. Both 
questions can, however, be avoided. Question 3, in the 
opinion of Keatinge, "represents the worst type of ques- 
tion that can be set. It is a direct encouragement to 
teach lists of names and characteristics of authors that 
the pupils have not read, and this is useless and senseless 
cram of the most unprofitable kind. It is a saddening 
reflection that many competent and earnest teachers 
have to spend their lives in preparing pupils to deal with 
papers of this kind, that a great university countenances 
such examining and derives a pecuniary profit from it, 
and that the money which rate payers contribute towards 
secondary education with such reluctance may be de- 
voted to work of which such papers determine the qual- 
ity. It is examinations of this type which deter many 
able men from entering the teaching profession." 2 The 

1 Examination Questions, College Entrance Examination Board, 1914, 

P- 74-75- 

2 Studies in the Teaching of History, 175. 



424 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

condemnation is severe, but is it too severe ? The paper 
as a whole leaves the impression, as Keatinge further 
suggests, that the examiners have aimed to ask questions 
not asked in previous examinations rather than to bring 
out the real significance of the period. 

In this last respect, the American paper, in spite of its 
larger scope, is plainly superior to the English paper. 
In its search for evidence of collateral reading and its 
introduction of map studies it brings in important ad- 
ditional elements. In other respects, it invites the same 
general comments as the English paper. The test as 
a whole is a test of memory. Question 3 calls for com- 
parison, but of a kind likely to be made in the text- 
book and emphasized by the teacher in class. It may, 
therefore, be simply a memory question. But even if it 
is not, the pupil who can "give the main provisions of 
each of these documents" has little to do in explaining 
"what the quotation means." Question 5 seems to call 
for independent interpretation and organization, but the 
answer is supplied directly by textbooks. Question 4 is 
in part saved from such strictures as were passed upon 
question 3 in the English paper by the call to "in- 
dicate briefly the nature or content of one of these 
works which you have read." But it remains a mem- 
ory question. 

The general answer of examiners to such criticism is 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 425 

that history teaching as now constituted admits of no 
other kind of examination. The statistics of the College 
Entrance Examination Board seem to indicate that the 
present ordeal is sufficiently severe. Of the 325 candi- 
dates who took the Board examination in English history, 
cited above, 29.8 per cent obtained a rating of 60 or over ; 
36.6 per cent obtained ratings below 40. These ratings 
compare very unfavorably with ratings in other subjects 
listed by the Board. In 19 14, 34.4 per cent of all candi- 
dates taking examinations in history obtained a rating 
of 60 or over ; the average for all subjects was 52.1 per 
cent. The record for history was lower than for any 
other subject except geography, and only 45 candidates 
offered the latter subject, while 2001 offered history. 1 
The mortality in the history examination has in fact 
become almost a public scandal, and has, especially 
during the last three or four years, excited vigorous 
comment. Numerous explanations have been offered. 
"The most common remark," says the History Teacher's 
Magazine, "has been that candidates try the history 
examinations after a process of cramming, or at the 
close of a short review course and without regular in- 
struction in the subject." 2 But the difference in the 
grades obtained by candidates of this type and the 

1 College Entrance Examination Board, Report, 1914, p. 54. 

2 Vol. IV, 256. 



426 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

grades obtained by candidates who have had regular 
instruction is too slight to save the situation for 
history. 

The questions, it is often urged, are too difficult and 
the standards of marking are too high. The questions, 
it is retorted, are reasonable and fair, the markings are 
lenient, it is the teaching of history that is bad and in 
need of reform. There is truth on both sides. The ques- 
tions are too difficult in that the teacher, unable to pre- 
dict where the lightning will strike, feels compelled to 
teach all of the facts in the ordinary textbook. The 
questions are entirely reasonable and fair in that the 
pupil who happens to find them within the range of his 
textbook knowledge has ready-made answers. There 
have, indeed, been cases in which the reading of a single 
manual on general history has enabled a pupil to pass 
examinations in three of the four blocks of history — 
ancient history, mediaeval and modern European his- 
tory, and English history. The teaching of history is, 
in many schools, undeniably bad. But the connection 
between bad teaching and the examination should not 
be overlooked. The teacher prepares for the examina- 
tion. The examination determines the character of 
the preparation. Each condition is in a measure re- 
sponsible for the other. There is need of reform at 
both ends. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 427 

That school instruction in history should leave behind 
a fund of definite information which it is entirely proper 
for examiners to test is denied by no sensible teacher. 
Memory questions have beyond doubt their place. But 
a history examination reduced wholly to memory ques- 
tions is unreasonable, unfair, and a standing inducement 
to reduce history teaching to memorizing. Facts are 
important. The American pupil should know more of 
them than he now seems to know, and know them more 
definitely. But the study of history, in any true sense, 
involves processes as well as a body of facts. To learn 
facts alone is in no real sense to learn history ; to ex- 
amine in facts alone is in no real sense to examine in 
history. This has been generally recognized and em- 
phasized in discussions of the aims and values of history 
teaching. But in practice history has fallen so far below 
the professions made for it that it is now barely tolerated 
by many educational critics and administrators, and, as 
we have seen, in some danger of being reduced to a posi- 
tion even lower than the relatively low position which it 
now holds in the curriculum. 

If history is to be an instrument of training and cul- 
ture, it must be used in school as an instrument of train- 
ing and culture. There must always be facts, but facts, 
as has been repeatedly intimated, should be reduced in 
number and expanded in content to the point of becom- 



428 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

ing really intelligible. They should be so definitely in- 
dicated by examiners as to remove the present anxiety 
to "get up" everything for the examination. The mem- 
ory test should not be allowed to dominate the history 
examination. It is, indeed, doubtful if more than a 
fourth, or perhaps a third, of the examination should be 
devoted to tests of ability to remember. The remainder 
of the paper could then be devoted to tests of ability to 
do : to interpret a map or picture ; to analyze a paragraph 
or a page of history ; to find materials on a given topic ; to 
solve by use of given materials a simple problem in criti- 
cism ; to recognize in given facts differing degrees of prob- 
ability ; to judge from a given description some histori- 
cal character ; to discover in given conditions, past and 
present, resemblances, differences, relations, tendencies ; 
to organize a given collection of facts ; to select from the 
work of a term or a year, facts of special importance 
and to explain why they are important. The general 
character of the possibilities has been indicated in the 
body of the present volume in discussing the possibilities 
of history teaching, and should be fairly clear to any 
teacher who has thought of the study of history as the 
learning and application of processes and not merely as 
the learning of facts. The following exercises are offered 
as illustrations of possible modes of procedure. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 429 

MAP INTERPRETATION 

Place before a class the physical map found in Shep- 
herd's Historical Atlas, pp. 2-3, or some other map of the 
same type, and give the following directions : 

1. Estimate from the map the height above sea level 
of the central plain of England. Compare with the 
height of some object with which you are familiar. 

2. Estimate from the map the distance from the mouth 
of the Seine to the Pyrenees Mountains. Compare with 
some distance which you have actually traveled. 

3. Estimate from the map the area in square miles of 
the Iberian Peninsula. Compare with the area of some 
region which you can really see when you close your eyes 
and think about it. 

COMPARISON AND APPRECIATION 

"In the same winter," says Thucydides, writing of the 
Peloponnesian War, "the Athenians gave a funeral at 
the public cost to those who had first fallen in this war." 
Pericles was chosen as the orator. In the address 
attributed to him by Thucydides he exhibits some reluc- 
tance to speak. 

"For myself," he says, "I should have thought that the worth 
which had displayed itself in deeds would have been sufficiently 
rewarded by honours also shown by deeds ; such as you now see 
in this funeral prepared at the people's cost. And I could have 



430 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

wished that the reputation of many brave men were not to be 
imperilled in the mouth of a single individual, to stand or fall 
according as he spoke well or ill. . . . However, since our ances- 
tors have stamped this custom with their approval, it becomes my 
duty to obey the law and to try to satisfy your several wishes 
and opinions as best I may." 

After describing the greatness and glory of Athens and 
the sacrifice of those who had fallen in her cause, he con- 
tinues : 

" So died these men as became Athenians. You, their survivors, 
must determine to have as unfaltering a resolution in the field, 
though you may pray that it may have a happier issue. And not 
contented with a mere hearsay notion of the advantages which 
are involved in the defence of your country, though these would 
furnish a valuable text to a speaker even before an audience 
so alive to them as the present, you must yourselves realise the 
power of Athens, and feed your eyes upon her from day to day, 
till love of her fills your hearts ; and then when all her greatness 
shall break upon you, you must reflect that it was by courage, 
sense of duty, and a keen feeling of honour in action that men 
were enabled to acquire it, and that no personal failure in an 
enterprise could make them consent to deprive their country of 
their valour, but they laid it at her feet as the most glorious con- 
tribution that they could offer. For this offering of their lives 
made in common by them all they each of them individually re- 
ceived that renown which never grows old, and for a sepulchre, 
not so much that in which their bones have been deposited, but 
that noblest of shrines wherein their glory is laid up to be eternally 
remembered upon every occasion on which deed or story shall 
call for its commemoration. For heroes have the whole earth 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 43 1 

for their tomb ; and in lands far from their own, where the column 
with its epitaph declares it, there is enshrined in every breast a 
record unwritten with no tablet to preserve it, except that of the 
heart." x 

Lincoln in his world-famed address at Gettysburg in 
1863 said: 

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon 
this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated 
to the proposition that all men are created equal. 

" Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that 
nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. 
We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to 
dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those 
who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is alto- 
gether fitting and proper that we should do this. 

" But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, 
we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, 
who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to 
add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what 
we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is 
for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished 
work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly ad- 
vanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task 
remaining before us; that from these honoured dead we take 
increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last 
full measure of devotion ; that we here highly resolve that these 
dead shall not have died in vain ; that this nation, under God, 
shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of 
the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish 
from the earth." 

1 Thucydides, II, 35-44, Crawley's translation. 



432 TEACHING OP HISTORY 

i. Find the differences and resemblances in the senti- 
ments expressed and the kind of appeal made to the audi- 
ence in these two speeches. 

2. Is there any sentiment expressed by Pericles which 
would not have been suitable at Gettysburg? If so, 
indicate what it is. 

3. Is there any sentiment expressed by Lincoln which 
would not have been suitable at Athens ? If so, indicate 
what it is. 

4. What comment is suggested by your answers to 2 
and 3? 

THE DETERMINATION OF PACTS 

In 1822, John Adams, in a letter to Timothy Pickering, 
gave an account of the drafting of the Declaration of 
Independence. The letter is printed in Randall's Life 
of Thomas Jefferson as follows : 

"The Committee met, discussed the subject, and then ap- 
pointed Mr. Jefferson and me to make the draft, I suppose because 
we were the two first on the list. The sub-committee met. Jeffer- 
son proposed to me to make the draft. I said, 'I will not.' 'You 
should do it.' 'Oh! no.' 'Why will you not? You ought to 
do it.' 'I will not.' 'Why?' 'Reasons enough.' 'What can 
be your reasons?' 'Reason first — You are a Virginian, and a 
Virginian ought to appear at the head of this business. Reason 
second — I am obnoxious, suspected, and unpopular. You are 
very much otherwise. Reason third — You can write ten times 
better than I can.' 'Well,' said Jefferson, 'if you are decided, I 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 433 

will do as well as I can.' 'Very well. When you have drawn it 
up, we will have a meeting.' A meeting we accordingly had, and 
conned the paper over. [After stating what he really liked and 
disliked in it, Mr. Adams proceeds :] I consented to report it, and 
do not now remember that I made or suggested a single alteration. 
We reported it to the Committee of five. It was read, and I do 
not remember that Franklin nor Sherman criticised anything. We 
were all in haste. Congress was impatient, and the instrument was 
reported, as I believe, in Jefferson's handwriting, as he first drew it." 

"This statement," says Randall, "was published in 
1823, and Jefferson soon after (August 30th) wrote Mr. 
Madison : 

"... Mr. Adams's memory has led him into unquestion- 
able error. At the age of eighty-eight, and forty-seven years after 
the transactions of Independence, this is not wonderful. Nor 
should I, at the age of eighty, on the small advantage of that difference 
only, venture to oppose my memory to his, were it not supported 
by written notes, taken by myself at the moment and on the spot." 
[After giving the substance of Mr. Adams's statement, he con- 
tinues:] "Now these details are quite incorrect. The Committee 
of five met ; no such thing as a sub-committee was proposed, but 
they unanimously pressed on myself alone to undertake the draft. 
I consented ; I drew it ; but before I reported it to the Committee, 
I communicated it separately to Doctor Franklin and Mr. Adams, 
requesting their corrections, because they were the two members 
of whose judgments and amendments I wished most to have the 
benefit, before presenting it to the Committee: and you have 
seen the original paper now in my hands, with the corrections of 
Doctor Franklin and Mr. Adams interlined in their own hand- 
writings. Their alterations were two or three only, and merely 
verbal. I then wrote a fair copy, reported it to the Committee, 



434 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

and from them, unaltered, to Congress. This personal communi- 
cation and consultation with Mr. Adams, he has misremembered 
into the actings of a sub-committee." 

The ''notes" to which Jefferson refers contain the fol- 
lowing statements : 

"The Committee were John Adams, Dr. Franklin, Roger Sher- 
man, Robert R. Livingston and myself. . . . The Committee for 
drawing the Declaration of Independence desired me to do it. It was 
accordingly done, and being approved by them, I reported it to the 
House on Friday, the 28th of June, when it was read and ordered 
to lie on the table." l 

1. What facts do you consider established by these 
two letters and Jefferson's notes ? 

2. Give your reasons. 

THE RECOGNITION OF DEGREES OF PROBABILITY 

The following statements relate to the Webster-Hayne 
debate : 

1. "Desiring to know how the country would receive the 
bare doctrine of nullification, Senator Hayne was put forward 
to deliver the prologue, but Calhoun was the prompter behind the 
scenes." 

2. "Hayne asserted that, in case of a palpable violation of the 
Constitution by the general government, a State may interpose 
its veto." 

3. "The Senator's speeches were not remarkable, and would 
never have been remembered, had not his most labored effort 

1 Randall, Life of Thomas Jefferson, I, 165-166. 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 435 

given Webster the occasion for one of those rare bursts of eloquence 
that astonish and delight the world." 

4. "Webster's oration itself is familiar to students of Ameri- 
can history, to lovers of English literature, and to all those whose 
admiration is kindled by eloquence in any tongues." 

(A) Indicate the kinds of sources that you would use 
in determining the truth or falsity of each of the above 
statements. 

(B) Which of the statements admits most readily of 
proof or disproof? Why? 

(C) Which of the statements do you consider the most 
difficult to prove or disprove? Why? 

SELECTION OF MATERIAL 

Two or three weeks before the examination assign to 
the class eight or ten general topics covering the signifi- 
cant parts of the work of the term or the year. Give 
the following directions : 

1. Write out for each topic one question that seems to 
you of special importance. 

2. Be prepared to answer definitely your own ques- 
tions. 

In the examination period inform the class that the 
questions which they have framed are to count as one 
question in the examination, and that as another part 
of the examination they are to answer any two of their 
own questions. 



43 6 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Or assign a smaller number of topics and have the 
questions prepared in the examination period. The fol- 
lowing may, for example, constitute part of an examina- 
tion in English history. 

i. Prepare on each of the following topics one ques- 
tion that seems to you of special importance : England 
under the Normans ; the personal monarchy of the early 
Stuarts; the foundation of the British Empire, 1689- 
1763 ; the period of reform, 1815-1852. 

2. Enter all the questions in your paper. 

3. Answer any two of your own questions. 
Examination along the lines here indicated is of course 

unfair to pupils accustomed merely to learn and to 
recite facts. The teacher may in such cases predict with 
confidence that the results will approximate zero. High 
school classes fairly proficient in pointing at maps, and 
in filling in dots and lines to indicate places and bounda- 
ries, have repeatedly answered with a blank stare when 
asked to estimate, from a map, elevation, extent, or area. 
Students still more advanced have repeatedly handed in 
blank papers when asked to use a little discrimination in 
weighing the probability of facts. But the principles 
have been found applicable as early as the sixth grade 
in testing classes trained to interpret maps and to think 
a little about the difference between proving a motive 
and proving what was said in a speech. Exercises of all 



THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 437 

the types that have been illustrated, and of all the other 
types suggested above in enumerating possibilities, can 
be adapted even to the elementary school. It requires, 
to be sure, something more than a knowledge of text- 
books to frame them. It takes more time for a pupil 
to work them out than to answer memory questions. 
But, for teachers in control of examinations and free to 
teach history as something more than facts to be memo- 
rized, there are so many opportunities in connection with 
the daily lessons to try the general processes that the 
problem is half solved by the mere act of consciously 
facing it. 

For those who must prepare for examinations from 
without, given by state, or college, or other authorities, 
the problem is more difficult. Few of the facts packed 
into the traditional textbook seem to be exempt from 
such examinations, and the only safe procedure may well 
seem to be to pack all of the textbook facts into the 
minds of the pupils. But even granting this dreary ne- 
cessity, it is still possible to meet the conditions without 
forgetting altogether that history should be an instru- 
ment of training and of culture. Indeed, the best guar- 
antee of that temporary memory of facts which examiners 
so generally seem to expect is to teach at least some of 
the facts intelligently. At the worst, the teacher can 
teach history six or seven of the nine or ten months of the 



i 



438 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

school year and devote the remaining months to a con- 
scientious cram for the examination. The cram, while 
not an ideal mode of "getting up" history, has uses be- 
yond the passing of examinations. So much of success in 
business and in the professions depends upon the ability 
to "get up" facts quickly, and to hold them clearly for 
some temporary purpose, that there is something to be 
said in favor of cultivating the ability in school. It is 
in any event better to reduce history to a grind for a few 
months than to keep it a grind throughout the year. 

Teachers must prepare for examinations ; examiners 
must adapt their questions to existing systems of teach- 
ing. Better teaching will be followed by better exami- 
nations ; better examinations will be followed by bet- 
ter teaching. But who shall break the vicious circle? 
Teachers blame examiners, examiners blame teachers, 
and both blame the situation. This relieves to some 
extent the emotions; it does not relieve the situation. 
There is need on both sides of more courage and more 
faith. Competent teachers, who find that they can teach 
history and still prepare for examinations, have a right to 
demand of examiners questions designed to furnish a more 
adequate test of sound instruction. Examiners have a 
right to assume sound instruction. Incompetent teachers 
have a right to adjust themselves to the standards of 
sound instruction or to seek more congenial occupation. 



I 



APPENDIX I 

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF HISTORY TEACHING 

A bibliography of the study and teaching of history. Compiled 
by James Ingersoll Wyer. Annual Report of the American 
Historical Association, 1899, pp. 561-612. Prepared for the 
Committee of Seven. The part in which "the pedagogical 
point of view is given first place" contains references to judiciously 
selected books and articles on the teaching of history in France, 
Great Britain, Germany, and the United States. Valuable chiefly 
for the latter half of the nineteenth century. The earlier period 
receives scant attention. 

The following brief list contains titles not cited by Wyer, and 
is designed merely to furnish some further indication of materials 
for a study of conditions in Europe before 1850. Russell's articles, 
cited farther on (p. 461), contain references to materials for a study 
of early conditions in the United States. 
Succinitz adversaires de Charles de la Rvelle escvyer, Sieur de Mauault, 

Preuost d'Hostel du Roy au voyage de Pologne, Contre VHistoire 

et professeurs d'icelle. Au roy de France et de Poloigne t Henry 

III. de ce nom. Poitiers, 1574. 
Jo. Mich. Bruti de histories, laudibus, ad Stephanum Polonorum 

regent. 1578. 
Institutionum Antiquitatis et Historiarum Pars prima in II. VI. 

distributa. Scripta a M. Andrea Franckenbergero. Wite- 

bergae, 1586. 
J oh. Bernati, de Utilitate legendce historic. Antverp, 1593. 
439 



440 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Synopsis Historiarum et methodus nova, etc., auctore J. Jacobo 
Beurero. Hanovise, 1594. 

/. Bodini methodus ad facilem Historiarum cognitionem. Amste- 
lodami, 1650. (First published in 1566.) 

De V usage de I'histoire. A Wezel, 1673. 

De I'histoire, Par le Pere le Moyne, de la Compagnie de Jesus. 
Paris, 1680. 

Coustel, Pierre. Les regies de V education des enfants, oil il est 
parte en detail de la maniere dont il se faut conduire, pour 
leur inspirer les sentiments d'une solide piete; et pour leur 
apprendre parfaitement les belles lettres. Two volumes. 
Paris, 1687. 

Danz, I. T. L. Ueber den methodischen Unterricht in der Geschichte 
auf Schulen. Leipzig, 1798. 

RiiHS, Fr. Entwurf einer Propadeutik des historischen Studiums. 
Berlin, 181 1. 

Schomann, G. Ueber den Vortrag der Geschichte auf Schulen. 
Greifswalde, 18 14. 

Gunther, Fr. Ueber den historisch-geographischen Unterricht auf 
h oheren Schulen . Leipzig , 1 8 1 5 . 

Boclo, Ludwig. Ueber die Wichtigkeit des Studiums der Geschichte 
auf Schulen. Hannover, 1818. 

Kohlrausch, Friedrich. Bemerkungen uber die Stufenfolge des 
Geschichtsunterrichts in den hbheren Schulen. Berlin, 1818. 

Briegleb, Aug. Ueber die N olwendigkeit des Geschichtsunterrichts 
in gelehrten Bildungsanstalten. Eisenach, 1819. 

Muller, Karl August. Ueber den Geschichtsunterricht auf Schu- 
len. Dresden, 1835. Includes an interesting bibliography. 

Reinblott, Hein. Aug. Ueber die Methode des Geschichtsunterrichts, 
besonders in Beziehung auf Fr. Kapp's Vorschldge filr die 
Behandlung dieses Unterrichtsgegenstandes. Rheinische Blatter 
fiir Erziehung und Unterricht. 1835. Heft 2, pp. 153-166. 



APPENDIX I 441 

Kilian, M. Tableau historique de V instruction secondaire en 

France, depuis les temps les plus recules jusqu'a nos jours. 

Paris, 1841. 
Voigtland, Friedrich. Ueber den historischcn Unterricht auf 

Gymnasien. J ahresbericht des Gymnasiums zu Schleusingen. 

1841. 
Vallet de Viriville. Histoire de V instruction publique en 

Europe, et principalement en France, depuis le Christianisme 

jusqu'a nos jours. Paris, 1849. 
Kay, Joseph. The social condition and education of the people in 

England and Europe. Two volumes. London, 1850. 
Rattig, Karl Herm. Ueber die Wahl des historischen Stoffes 

fur den Gymnasialunterricht. Zu der ojfentlichen Priifung 

in dem Gymnasium Carolinum. Neu-Strelitz, 1850. 
Munscher, Friedrich. Abhandlung ueber den Geschichts- 

Unterricht auf Gymnasien. Zu der ofentlichen Priifung der 

Schiller des Kurfiirstlichen Gymnasiums zu Marburg. 1853. 
Thery, A. F. Histoire de V education en France depuis le V e siecle 

jusqu'a nos jours. Two volumes. Paris, 1861. 
Compayre, Gabriel. Histoire critique des doctrines de l' education 

en France depuis le seizieme siecle. Two volumes. Paris, 1885. 
Greard, Octave. Education et instruction. Two volumes. 

Paris, 1889. 
Gallandt, Julius. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Geschichts- 

Unterrichts im Zeitalter der deutschen A ufklarung. Berlin , 1 900. 
Ottelin, A. K. Herbartiansk historieundervissning. Helsingfors, 

1908. 
Reim, Carl. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. Halle, 191 1. 

pp. 176-216. 
Silvy, A. Essai d'une bibliographic historique de I'enseignement 

secondaire et superieur en France avant la revolution. Paris, 

no date. 



I 



442 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Current Discussion 

The History Teacher's Magazine. Founded in 1909 and now edited 
under the supervision of a committee of the American His- 
torical Association. A. E. McKinley, managing editor. 
Monthly, except July and August. McKinley Publishing 
Company, Philadelphia. Annual subscription, $2. Indis- 
pensable. 

Vergangenheit und Gegenwart. Zeitschrift fiir den Geschichtsunter- 
richt und Staatsbilrgerliche Erziehung in alien Schulgattungen. 
Herausgeber. : Dr. Fritz Friedrich und Dr. Paul Ruhl- 
mann. Founded in 191 1. Published by G. B. Teubner, 
Leipzig. Six numbers yearly. Annual subscription, $1.50. 
(M. 6.) The most valuable record of European ideas and 
practice. 

History. A quarterly magazine for the student and the expert. 
Edited by Harold F. B. Wheeler. London. 1 New Court, 
Lincoln's Inn, W.C. Annual subscription, 4 shillings. 
Founded in 191 2. Contains some articles on the teaching of 
history. 



APPENDIX II 
GUIDES TO HISTORICAL LITERATURE 

Minimum Collection 

Andrews, C. M., Gambrill, J. M., and Tall, Lida Lee. Bibliog- 
raphy of history for schools and libraries. New York, iqio. 
A brief annotated guide to works on the study and teaching 
of history, world histories, histories of special countries, 
historical stories for the elementary school, and stories for 
children preparatory to history. The most serviceable 
general guide for teachers. 

A history syllabus for secondary schools. Prepared by a special 
committee of the New England History Teachers' Associa- 
tion. Boston, 1904. Outlines the four years' course recom- 
mended by the Committee of Seven. Suggests collections 
of books for each of the four fields and lists specific references 
for topics in each field. 

Historical sources in school. Report to the New England History 
Teachers' Association by a select committee. New York, 
1902. Covers the four fields recommended by the Committee 
of Seven. Description and criticism of the most important 
sources available for schools. 

A Brief List of Standard Guides 
Langlois, Ch. V. Manuel de bibliographic historique. In two 
parts. Part I: Instruments bibliographiques. Second edi- 
tion, Paris, 1901. Part II: Histoire et organisation des 

443 



444 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

etudes historiques. Paris, 1904. Description and appraisal 
of historical bibliographies. Covers the entire field. 

Ancient History to 375 a.d. Wachsmuth, Curt. Einleitung 
in das Studium der alten Geschichte. Leipzig, 1895. Lists 
original sources and critical studies of original sources. 

The Middle Ages. Potthast, A. Bibliotheca historica medii 
cevi. Wegweiser durch die Geschichtswerke des europdischen 
Mittelalters bis 1500. Two volumes. Berlin, 1895-1896. 

Germany to 1888. Dahlmann-Waitz. Quellenkunde der 
deutschen Geschichte. Quellen und Bearbeitungen, systematisch 
und chronologisch Verzeichnet. Sixth edition. Gottingen, 
1894- 

France to 1789. Monod, G. Bibliographic de Vhistoire de 
France. Paris, 1888. Follows the plan of Dahlmann-Waitz. 

England. Gardiner, S. R., and Mullinger, J. B. Introduction 
to the study of English history. London, 1894. Part II: 
Authorities. Classified as contemporary, non-contemporary, 
and modern writers. Indicates the chief collections of 
sources. 

Gross, Charles. The sources and literature of English history 
from the earliest times to about 1485. London, 1900. 

The United States. Larned, J. N., Editor. The literature of 
American history. A. L. A. annotated guide. Boston, 1902. 
"A bibliographical guide in which the scope, character, and 
comparative worth of books in selected lists are set forth in 
brief notes by critics of authority." Boston, 1902. And 
supplements issued by the American Library Association. 

Channing, E., Hart, A. B., and Turner, F. J. Guide to the 
study and reading of American history. Boston, 191 2. Classi- 
fied lists, and a topical analysis of American history with 
specific references. The most comprehensive guide to 
American history. 



APPENDIX II 445 

Important Periodicals 

Historische Zeitschrift. Leipzig. Founded in 1859. Quarterly, 

1859-1876. Bimonthly since 1877. 
Revue Historique. Paris. Founded in 1876. Bimonthly since 

1877. 
English Historical Review. London. Founded in 1886. New 

York, Longmans, Green, & Company. Quarterly. 
American Historical Review. Founded in 1895. New York, 

Macmillan Company. Quarterly. 



APPENDIX III 

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF ILLUSTRATIVE MATERIAL 

Materials listed below can be ordered through any dealer in 

foreign books. 

Illustrierter Lehrmittel-Katalog. Verzeichnis der neuesten, besten 
und bewahrtesten Anschauungs- und Lehrmittel. Leipzig. K. 
F. Koehler. Furnished only to dealers, 50 cents. From 
dealers in the United States, about $1. An invaluable guide 
to German materials. 

Lehrmittel fiir den Geschichtsunterricht. Wandtafeln u. Modelle 
zur Veranschaulichung des Lebens der Griechen und Rbmer. 
A. Pichlers Witwe & Sohn. Vienna. A circular descriptive 
of Gall and Rebhann models and wall pictures. Gratis. 

Stofflehrmiltel fur den Geschichtsunterricht. Modelle zur Vater- 
landischen Kulturgeschichte. Modelle zur antiken Kultur- 
geschichte. Friedrich Rausch, Nordhausen a. Harz. Cir- 
culars descriptive of the Rausch, and Blumner and Rausch, 
models. Gratis. 

Minister e de l' instruction publique et des beaux-arts. Archives de 
La Commission des Monuments Historique. Paris, 1904. 
Can be obtained from E. Hautecceur, 35 Avenue de l'Opera, 
Paris. Classified lists of photographs. 

Coulomb, C. A. Aids to the visualization of history. Reprint 
from History Teacher's Magazine, February, 191 o. McKin- 
ley Publishing Company, Philadelphia. 15 cents. Descrip- 
tion of exhibit at Teachers College, Columbia University, 
446 



APPENDIX III 447 

New York, 1909. Materials in the Teachers College collec- 
tion. Classified lists and prices. 

Catalogue of material collected by the New England History 
Teachers' Association. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 
191 2. 50 cents. Classified lists and prices. 

McKinley, A. E. Illustrative material for history classes. 
History Teacher's Magazine, IV, 158-168. Lists of dealers 
and publishers, with description of materials and of catalogues. 

Historical Association Leaflets, Nos. 12, 13. London, 1908. 
Portraits and lantern slides, chiefly for British and modern 
history. Historical maps and atlases. 

A. L. A. Portrait Index. Washington, 1906. Index to portraits 
contained in printed books and periodicals. 

SUGGESTIONS FOR A SMALL COLLECTION OF 
FOREIGN MATERIAL 

Models 

Roman house, Hensell. $12. Or, Roman house, Bliimner and 
Rausch. $15. Larger and more elaborate than the Hensell 
model. 

Hensell lay figure for displaying Greek and Roman costumes. 
About 4 ft. high. $18. Costumes, complete, $28. Articles 
can be purchased separately. Roman toga, $6.75. Or, 
Bliimner and Rausch lay figure. $45. Life size. Costumes, 
$54.50. Articles can be purchased separately. Roman toga, 
$9. 

Gall and Rebhann loom. $4.25. 

Models of Greek and Roman coins, 56 pieces. $18. K. F. 
Koehler. 

Groups of Rausch models. Can be ordered by group numbers. 
Any article also sold separately. 



448 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Group I. Plants and agricultural implements, 13 pieces. 
$20. 

Group III. Linen manufacturing, 15 pieces. $37.50. 

Group V. Fire and lighting apparatus, 15 pieces. 
$18.75. 

Group XII. Mediaeval inventions, 4 pieces. $12. 
Includes Gutenberg printing press. 

Wall Pictures 

Cybulski. Tabulae quibus antiquitates Graecae et Romanae 
illustrantur. In colors. 

Greek house. $1. Descriptive text, 25 cents. 

Roman house. $1. Descriptive text, 25 cents. 

Costumes of the Greeks and Romans, 5 pictures, each $1. 

Descriptive text, 40 cents. 
Lehmann. Kulturgeschichtliche Bilder fur den Schulunterricht. 
Paper, mounted, each 70 cents. In colors. 

Cloister, 10th century. 

Castle, 13th century. 

Interior of castle, 13th century. 

Interior of city, 15th century. 

Interior of town house, 16th century. 

Peasants, etc., 16th century. 

Rococo scene, 18th century. 

Mediaeval manuscripts. 

Examples of early printing. 

Descriptive text and comment: Heymann und Uebel. 
Aus Vergangenen Tagen. Bound, $1.15. Same authors: 
Aus dem Schriftwesen des Mittelalters. Pamphlet. 30 
cents. 



APPENDIX III 449 

Historical Albums 

Cybulski. Die Kultur der Griechen und Romer. Bilder- Atlas mit 

erlauterndem Texte. Bound, $i. 
Fougeres, G. La vie privee et publique des Grecs et des Romains. 

Hachette, Paris. Bound, $2.40. 
Lavisse et Parmentier. Album historique. Colin, Paris. 4 Vols. 

Bound, $16. 

Maps 

Schreiber. Wandtafel zur Veranschaulichung geographischer 
Grundbegriffe. Mounted, $1.15. Descriptive text, 10 cents. 

Vidal-Lablache. Cartes murales. Colin, Paris. Double-faced, 
each $1.30. Descriptive text, questions, and answers, for 
each map, 8 cents. 



APPENDIX IV 

SELECTED REFERENCES 

Chapter I 

WHAT HISTORY IS 

Methodology 

Bernheim, Ernst. Lehrbuch der historischen Methode und der 
Geschichtsphilosophie. Leipzig, 1908. Sixth edition. The 
standard treatise. See especially Chap. 1, sections 1 and 6; 
Chap. 3, sections 1 and 2 ; and Chap. 6. 

Bernheim, Ernst. Einleilung in die Geschichtswissenschqft. 
Leipzig, 1905. A brief summary of the Lehrbuch. See es- 
pecially pp. 5-13, 33-43, 72-78, 113-134. 

Langlois, Ch. V., and Seignobos, Ch. Introduction aux etudes 
historiques. Paris, 1905. (First published, 1897.) 

Langlois, Ch. V., and Seignobos, Ch. Introduction to the study 
of history. New York, 1903. Translation by G. B. Berry. 
A clear statement of the conditions and methods of historical 
study. See especially Book II, Chap. 1 ; Book III, Chaps. 
1,5; and the Conclusion. 

Fling, F. M. Outline of historical method. Lincoln, 1899. Out- 
lines "the substance of the method of historical research as 
found in the works of Bernheim, and Langlois and Seignobos." 
Contains comment of special interest to teachers. 

Rickert, Heinrich. Die Grenzen der naturwissenschaftlichen 
Begriffsbildung. Leipzig, 1902. Draws a suggestive dis- 



APPENDIX IV 451 

tinction between the historical method and the method of the 
natural sciences. See especially Chap. Ill, section 4. This 
book is admirably summarized by F. M. Fling in an article 
on Historical Synthesis, American Historical Review, IX, 1-22. 
Vincent, J. M. Historical research. An outline of theory and 
practice. New York, 191 1. See especially Chaps. 1, 2, 19, 
21, 22. Contains numerous concrete illustrations of special 
value to teachers. 

History of History 

Shotwell, J. T. Article on History in Encyclopedia Britannica, 

nth edition. 
Robinson, J. H. The New History. New York, 191 2. pp. 1- 

100. The new history ; the history of history ; the new 

allies of history. 
Bury, J. B. The ancient Greek historians. New York, 1909. 
Langlois, Ch. V. Manuel de bibliographic historique. Part II. 

Paris, 1904. The history and organization of historical 

studies since the Renaissance. 
Fueter, Eduard. Geschichte der neueren Historio 'graphic Hand- 

buch der mittelalterlichen und neueren Geschichte. Munchen, 

1911. 
Gooch, G. P. History and historians in the nineteenth century. 

New York, 1913. See by the same author : The growth of 

historical science. Cambridge Modern History, XII. New 

York, 1910. pp. 816-850. 
Flint, Robert. History of the philosophy of history. New York, 

1894. pp. 42-87. 
Julian, C. Historiens Francais du XIX e siecle. Paris, 1897. 
Guilland, A. L'Allemagne et ses historiens. Paris, 1899. 
Jameson, J. F. History of historical writing in America. Boston, 

1891. 



452 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Brief Articles by American Historians 

Adams, G. B. History and the philosophy of history. American 

Historical Review, XIV, 221-236. 
Cheyney, E. P. What is history ? History Teacher's Magazine, 

II, 75-95- 
Rhodes, J. F. History. Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 85, pp. 158- 

169. 
Sloane, W. M. The vision and substance of history. American 

Historical Review, XVII, 235-251. 
Winsor, Justin. The perils of historical narrative. Atlantic 

Monthly, Vol. 66, pp. 289-297. 

Chapter II 
THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 

Allen, J. W. The place of history in education. London, 1909. 
pp. 1-105. Extended analysis of the problem. 

Barnes, Mary Sheldon. Studies in historical method. Boston, 
1896. pp. 47-105. Compares the historic sense of primitive 
peoples with the historic sense in children. Describes experi- 
ments with children tending to support the culture-epoch 
theory. 

Behrendt, Walter. Die Beliebtheit des Geschichtsunterrichts 
auf Grund experimentaler Untersuchungen. Vergangenheit 
und Gegenwart, 1913, Heft 5, pp. 308-317. Shows the prefer- 
ences of pupils for the various school studies, with special 
comment on the statistics for history. Summarizes the work 
of recent investigators. 

Bernheim, Ernst. Geschichtswissenschaft und Geschichtsunter- 
richt. Neue Bahnen, X, 265-300; 337-357. Summary and 
criticism of German theories, with an extended discussion of 



APPENDIX IV 453 

Lamprecht. Favors the culture-epoch theory, but would 
have instruction at every stage in harmony with facts. 

Dewey, John. The aim of history in elementary education. 
Elementary School Record, No. 8, pp. 199-203. "Whatever 
history may be for the scientific historian, for the educator 
it must be an indirect sociology." Description of program 
and reports of work, by Georgia F. Bacon and others, Ibid., 
204-209. 

Hall, G. S. Educational problems, II, 278-310. A general dis- 
cussion of the "pedagogy of history." Favors the culture- 
epoch theory. See p. 290. 

Hinsdale, B. A. How to study and teach history. New York, y 
1908. pp. 42-52, 67-74. Touches the problem of grading 
incidentally in discussing the choice and organization of facts. 

Kausche, W. Anekdote und Legende im Geschichtsunterricht. 
Beilage zum J ahresbericht des kgl. Domgymnasiums und 
Real gymnasiums zu Kolberg, 1906. pp. 1-40. 

Jager, Oskar. Bemerkungen iiber den geschichtlichen Unterricht. 
Beigabe zu dem "Hilfsbuch fiir den ersten Unterricht in alter 
Geschichte.'" 1892. pp. 3-47. 

Keatinge, M. W. Studies in the teaching of history. London, , 
1910. pp. 20-35. Contrasts the problems presented by 
"natural science" with the problems presented by "human 
science." The general conclusion is that "the schoolboy 
can be turned into either of them with equal ease." 

Laurie, S. S. History in the school. School Review, IV, 649-663. 
Culture-epoch theory. 

Mace, W. H. Method in History. Boston, 1897. pp. 255-308. 
Indicates clearly the steps in introducing children to the five 
forms of institutional life about which the author organizes 
history. The treatment of "the sense phase of history" 
(pp. 255-268) of special value. 



454 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Muzzey, D. S. The problem of correlating the work in history 
in the elementary school, high school, and college. Report, 
Association of History Teachers of the Middle States and 
Maryland, 1906. pp. 13-28. Illustrates the difficulty of 
grading history. 

Salmon, Lucy M. Some principles in the teaching of history. 
Yearbook, National Society for the Scientific Study of Educa- 
tion. Chicago, 1902. pp. 39-47. Finds in each of five 
stages of development a dominant mental trait which deter- 
mines materials and treatment. For criticism of this view 
see Yearbook of the same society, 1903. 

Seignobos, Ch. L'histoire dans V enseignement secondaire. Paris, 
1906. pp. 3-25. A clear analysis of the problem. History 
should begin with concrete facts relating to the material 
aspects of the past. We should avoid abstract terms. 

Scheiblhuber, A. C. Das Erlebnis in seiner Bedeutung fur den 
elementaren Geschichtsunterricht. Vergangenheit und Gegen- 
wart, 1911, Heft 1, pp. 54-58. "Das Kingd phantasiert, wo 
der Erwachsene denkt, und wo es nicht zuvor phantasiert 
hat, denkt es auch hinterher nicht." 

Tucker, Henry R. The doctrine of interest. History Teacher's 
Magazine, III, 50-53. A general view of the doctrine "as 
related to instruction in the social sciences in the high school." 

Wilson, Roland K. Should history be taught backward ? 
Contemporary Review, Vol. 70, pp. 391-407. 

Winterburn, R. V. Some studies of children in history teaching. 
Education, XXI, 37-44. By the same author: Ethnological 
consideration of history for the grades. Ibid., XXII, 212- 
217. 



APPENDIX IV 455 

Chapter III 
THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 

"I have always been of the opinion," wrote Karl August Miiller 
in 1835, "that nothing is more useless for a teacher than to talk 
about the value of his subject. Those who understand the matter 
need no praise of it ; those who do not will learn more readily 
through experience than through words." In the case of history 
there was a further objection. So much had already been written 
that no one could hope to say anything new. 1 Few writers on 
the teaching of history seem to have agreed with Miiller that it is 
useless to talk about values, but many have illustrated the diffi- 
culty of saying anything new. The following list is confined to 
expressions of opinion in our own time, chiefly in the United States, 
and is believed to be fairly representative both of what is common- 
place and of what is exceptional in current discussion. 

General Discussions 

Allen, J. W. The place of history in education, 156-179. 
Bourne, H. E. Teaching of history and civics. New York, 1910. 

pp. 77-92. 
Burr, G. L. History as a teacher and the teacher of history. 

History Teacher's Magazine, III, 95-98. 
Harrison, F. The meaning of history and other historical pieces. 

New York, 1894. pp. 1-23. 
Hinsdale, B. A. How to study and teach history, 2-17. 
Jameson, J. F. The future uses of history. History Teacher's 

Magazine, IV, 35-40. 
McMurry, C. A. Special Method in History. New York, 1913. 

pp. 1-17. 

1 Miiller nevertheless did his duty and produced 34 pages on the question. 
Ueber den Geschichtsunterricht auf Schulen, 14-48. 



456 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Report, Committee of Seven, 16-26, 158-162. 
Reim, Carl. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts , 1-20. 
Spencer, F., editor. Chapters on the aims and practice of teach- 
ing. Cambridge, 1899. History, by J. E. Lloyd, 141-155. 

Special Phases of the Question 

Andrews, C. M. History as an aid to moral culture. Proceed- 
ings, National Education Association, 1894. pp. 397- 
411. 

Barnes, Mary Sheldon. Studies in historical method, 106-121. 
Emphasizes the making of patriots. 

Blalr, F. G. The social function of history. Yearbook, Herbart 
Society, 1898. pp. 44-56. 

Bowman, J. N. What others think of history. History Teacher's 
Magazine, III, 143-145. Opinions of men in various walks 
of life. 

Jackson, L. F. A single aim in history teaching. History 
Teacher's Magazine, V, 245-248. "History alone attempts 
to show matters in their relation to time, to emphasize the 
importance of sequence in life." One of the few attempts 
to set up for instruction in history an aim distinct from the 
aims of instruction in other subjects. 

Langlois and Seignobos. Introduction to the study of history, 
331. "We understand that the value of every science con- 
sists in its being true, and we ask from history truth and 
nothing more." 

Lea, C. H. Ethical values in history. American Historical Re- 
view, IX, 233-246. A criticism of Lord Acton's exhortation 
"to try others by the final maxim that governs" our own 
lives and "to suffer no man and no cause to escape the un- 
dying penalty which history has the power to inflict on 
wrong." Lea illustrates the changing standards of morals 



APPENDIX IV 457 

and finds a fallacy in judging the past by our own "moral 
yardstick." 

Lecky, W. E. H. The political value of history. New York, 1893. 

Paulus, E. Die zukiinftige Friedenschluss und die Schule. 
Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1915. Heft 2, pp. 112-117. 
Forecasts the effects of the present war on the teaching of 
history. 

Sloane, W. M. How to bring out the ethical value of history. 
School Review, VI, 724-744. 

Snedden, D. Teaching of history in secondary schools. History 
Teacher's Magazine, V, 277-282. A criticism of traditional 
answers to the question, "Why should history be taught?" 
would surrender chronological order and idea of unity and 
"adjust the teaching of history to the study of contemporary 
social science." There is an answer to this article in the 
same number of the Magazine, 283-287. What history 
shall we teach ? By G. L. Burr. 



Chapter IV 

HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN 
EUROPE 

HISTORY OF HISTORY TEACHING 

No General Survey of the Field has as yet Appeared 

Gallandt, Julius. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Geschichts- 
unterrichts im Zeitalter der deutschen Aufklarung. Berlin, 
1900. 

Pizard, Alfred. L'histoire dans V enseignement primaire. Paris, 
1891. 



45§ TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Reim, Carl. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. Berlin, 191 1. 
pp. 176-216. 

Richter, Albert. Geschichtsunterricht im 17. Jahrhundert. 
Pddagogisches Magazin. Heft 35. Langensalza, 1893. pp. 
1-27. 

Rosenburg, Hermann. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. 
Breslau, 1910. pp. 130-145. 

Withers, H. L. The teaching of history and other papers. Man- 
chester, 1904. pp. 141-163. The teaching of history in 
England in the nineteenth century. 

The Teaching of History since 1890 

1. Description of Conditions 

Baar, Joseph. Studien uber den geschichtlichen Unterricht an 
den hoheren Lehranstalten des Auslandes. Beilage zum 
Programm des Pro gymnasiums in Malmedy. In two parts, 
1895, 1897. Describes conditions in France, Russia, the 
United States, England, Spain, and Norway. Includes 
also Italian program of 1894 and Austrian program of 1884. 

Horn, Ewald. Das h'ohere Schulwesen der Staaten Europas. 
Eine Zusammenstellung der Stundedplane. Berlin, 1907. 

Observations on the schools of Great Britain, Belgium, and Germany, 
by a committee of Pittsburgh teachers. Pittsburgh, 1908. 

Report of a conference on the teaching of history in the London ele- 
mentary schools. London, 191 1. pp. 17-32. A brief descrip- 
tion of the teaching of history in elementary schools in the 
British Dominions, the United States, Germany, Austria, 
Hungary, Norway, Holland, Belgium, France, Italy, and 
Japan. 

Woods, M. Edith. Report of the teaching of history in the schools 
of Germany and Belgium. London, 1902. 



APPENDIX IV 459 

Fox, G. L. History in English secondary schools. Report, 

Committee of Seven, 210-230. 
Board of Education special reports on educational subjects, 

Vol. 24. London, 191 1. pp. 54-64. A translation of the 

syllabus in history for boys' lycees in France. 
Farrington, F. E. French secondary schools. New York, 1910. 

pp. 237-256. The teaching of history and geography. 
Haskins, C. H. History in the French lycees. Report, Com- 
mittee of Seven, 199-209. 
L'Hopital, M. L'enseignement de 1'histoire dans les lycees et 

colleges de l'Academie de Montpellier. L'Enseignement 

Secondaire, Feb. 15, 1909, pp. 61-67 I March 1, 1909, pp. 85- 

93. An illuminating survey of actual conditions. 
Lemonnier, H. L'enseignement de Vhistoire dans les ecoles 

primaires. Paris, 1889. pp. 223-268. 
Schlottert, N. Der Geschichtsunterricht in Frankreich. Ver- 

gangenheit und Gegenwart, 1913. Heft 1, pp. 29-42. 
Bolton, F. The secondary school system of Germany. New 

York, 1900. pp. 235-250. The teaching of history and 

geography. 
Davison, Ellen S. History in German secondary schools. 

Educational Review, Vol. 40, pp. 356-368. 
Dodge, Eva. The teaching of history in girls' schools in north and 

central Germany. Manchester, 1908. Contains reports of 

actual lessons. 
Russell, J. E. German higher schools. New York, 1913. pp. 

291-3 1 1. Instruction in history and geography. 
Salmon, Lucy M. History in the German Gymnasia. Report, 

Committee of Seven, 173-198. 
Clausnitzer, E. Der Geschichtsunterricht nach den preussischen 

Mittelschulplanen vom 3. Februar 1910. Vergangenheit und 

Gegenwart, 191 1. Heft 2, pp. n 2-1 18. 



460 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Muller, C. Die Geschichtslehrplane der preussischen und 
sachsischen hoheren Madchenschulen. Vergangenheit und 
Gegenwart, 191 2. Heft 1, pp. 34-42. 

Reichel, M. Der neue miinchener Geschichtslehrplan. Ver- 
gangenheit und Gegenwart, 1913. Heft 1, pp. 23-29. 

Kende, O. Geschichte im Lehrplan der osterreichischen hoheren 
Schulen. Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 2. Heft 2, pp. 
96-108. 

Degani, M. A. Some aspects of Italian education, with special 
reference to the teaching of history and the mother tongue. Lon- 
don, 1904. 

2. Special Discussions of Theory and Method 

Curteis, A. M. The teaching of history in preparatory schools. 
Board of Education special reports on educational subjects. 
Vol. 6. London, 1900. pp. 207-218. 

Essays on the teaching of history. Cambridge, 1901. Views of 
representative English historians. The teaching of history 
in schools by W. H. Woodward, 69-91. 

KeatInge, M. W. Studies in the teaching of history. London, 1910. 

Report of a conference on the teaching of history in the London ele- 
mentary schools, 33-72. 

Teaching of history in secondary schools. London, 1908. Cir- 
cular No. 599, Board of Education. 

Tibbey, T. G. On the teaching of history. Westminster Review, 
Vol. 151, pp. 516-526. 

Withers, H. L. Teaching of history, 167-201. Memorandum 
on the teaching of history in elementary schools. 

Langlois and Seignobos. Introduction to the study of history, 
3 2 5 _ 334- The secondary teaching of history in France. 

Lavisse, E. A propos de nos ecoles. Paris, 1895. pp. 77-107. 
De l'enseignement de l'histoire. 



APPENDIX IV 461 

L'enseignetnent de Vhistoire. Conferences du Musee Pedagogique, 
1907. Contains papers by Seignobos, Langlois, and Gal- 
louedec, and 68 pages of discussion of these papers. Illus- 
trates admirably the methods and spirit of secondary his- 
torical instruction in France. 

Seignobos, Ch. Vhistoire dans V ' enseignement secondaire. Sug- 
gests methods and apparatus for making the new conception 
of history for the lycees effective. 

Jager, O. Didaktik und Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. 
Miinchen, 1905. 

Jager, 0. The teaching of history. Translated by H. J. Chaytor. 
Chicago, 191 5. 

Lorenz, Karl. Der moderne Geschichtsunterricht. Miinchen, 
1897. 

Reim, Carl. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. Halle, 1911. 

Rosenburg, H. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts. Breslau, 1910. 

Strunk, H. Heimatkunde und Geschichtsunterricht an den 
hoheren Schulen Preussens. Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 
1912. Heft 1, pp. 24-34. 

Tecklenburg, A. Vom Geschichtsunterricht in der Volkschule. 
Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 1. Heft 2, pp. 90-106. 

Chapter V 

HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN THE 
UNITED STATES 

Russell, W. F. Why history came into the curriculum of the 
secondary schools of the United States. History Teacher's 
Magazine, V, 203-208. The entrance of history into the 
curriculum of the secondary school. Ibid., 311-318. Early 
methods of teaching history in secondary schools. Ibid., 



462 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

VI, 14-19; 44-52. List of historical textbooks published 

before 1861. (In the United States.) Ibid., 122-125. The 

only important contribution on the early teaching of history 

in the United States. 
Bourne, H. E. Teaching of history and civics, 56-76. A sketch. 

of conditions since 1892. 
Zimmern, Alice. Methods of education in the United States. 

London, 1894. Discussion of history, 61-77. 
Hennig, E. Der Geschichtsunterricht in der Vereinigten Staaten. 

Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1914. Heft 4, pp. 235-247. 

Reports of Committees 
Committee of Ten on secondary school studies. New York, 1894. 

pp. 28-59, 162-201. 
Butler, N. M. Reform of secondary education in the United 

States. Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 73, pp. 372-384. Review 

of report of Committee of Ten. 
Committee of Fifteen on elementary education. New York, 

1895. pp. 81-83, 93-95, 103. 
Committee of Twelve on rural schools. Proceedings, National 

Education Association, 1897, pp. 550-551. 
Committee of Seven. The study of history in schools. New York, 

1899. See especially pp. 1-15, 134-157. 
Committee of Three appointed by the American Peace Society. 

The teaching of history in the public schools with reference to 

war and peace. Boston, 1906. 
Committee of Eight. The study of history in elementary schools. 

New York, 1909. See especially pp. v-xvii, 123-130. 
Committee of Five. The study of history in secondary schools. 

New York, 1911. See especially pp. 1-13, 57-69. 
Committee on Social Studies. Preliminary report. History 

Teacher's Magazine, IV, 291-296. 



appendix iv 463 

College Entrance Requirements 

Monroe's Cyclopedia of Education, II, 14-16. A brief historical 
summary. 

General Treatises on the Teaching of History 

A score or more produced in the United States during the last 
thirty years. For an annotated list of the most important 
examples see Andrews, Gambrill, and Tall, Bibliography of 
history for schools and libraries, 1-10. The following have 
appeared since the publication of this bibliography : 

Bliss, W. F. History in the elementary schools. Methods, courses 
of study, bibliographies. New York, 191 1. 

Hartwell, E. C. The teaching of history. Boston, 1913. 

Wayland, J. W. How to teach American history. New York, 
1914. 

Current Ideas and Practice 

History Teacher's Magazine. Philadelphia, 1909. Problems of 
special present interest are discussed in the following articles : 
Ashley, R. L. Unity and Continuity in high school history 
courses, VT, 140-144. Davis, C. O. Realizable educa- 
tional values in history, VI, 167-178. Draper, A. S. No 
mummified history in New York schools, III, 71-73. 
Gathany, J. M. The reconstruction of history teaching, V, 
223-227. Hayes, C. H. Propriety and value of the study 
of recent history, IV, 243-248. Muzzey, D. S. How 
modern shall we make our modern history? Ill, 25-28. 
Priddy, Bessie L. Articulation of our history courses, 
IV, 188-193. Sioussat, St. George L. History in the 
high school curriculum: a plea for fair play, V, 87-91, 
Sprague, C. A. Reorganization of high school courses. 
IV, 222-223. 



464 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Bagley, W. G. The determination of minimum essentials in 
elementary geography and history. Yearbook, National. 
Society for the Study of Education. Chicago, 1915. pp. 
131-146. 

Chapter VI 
THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 

Biography, as an introduction to history in school, is, by its 
advocates, now so commonly ranked with the eternal verities of 
education that one finds in current discussion multa non multum. 

Gosse, Edmund. Article on Biography in Encyclopedia Britan- 
nica, nth edition. Traces briefly the history of biography 
and mentions the most famous biographies. 

Bernheim, E. Geschichtswissenschaft und Geschichtsunterricht. 
Neue Bahnen, X, 338-342. An adverse criticism. 

Bourdeau, L. Uhistoire et les historiens. Paris, 1888. pp. 13- 
109. Considers biography from the standpoint of history 
and not of the teaching of history. A radical opponent of 
the biographical theory. 

Kemp, E. W. Outline of method in history. Terre Haute, 1897. 
pp. 264-295. A general discussion of the use of biography 
in school. Chief emphasis upon moral value. 

Lawless, Emily. Of the personal element in history. Nineteenth 
Century, Vol. 50, pp. 790-798. 

Mace, W. H. Method in history. Boston, 1897. pp. 283-294. 
Shows the use and value of "the ideal historical person" and 
of "the real historical person" in school studies of history. 

Moore, F. W. The real and the ideal in history. Sewanee Re- 
view, XI, 412-424. Demands heroes. "In truth it is not 
the men whom we honor, but the virtues which they ex- 
emplify." 



APPENDIX IV 465 

Reim, Carl. Methodik des Geschichtsunterrichts, 49-57. Ex- 
amines the arguments for and against the biographical 
treatment of history in school. 



Chapter VII 
THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 

General Conceptions 

Gooch, G. P. History and historians in the nineteenth century, 
573~594- Historical sketch of histories of civilization. 

Langlois and Seignobos. Introduction to the study of history, 
232-251. The grouping of facts. Indicates processes to be 
applied by the historian. 

Bourdeau, L. L'histoire et les historiens, 289-306. Applies the 
statistical method. 

Lamprecht, Karl. What is history? New York, 1905. See 
especially pp. 3-35, 137-179. "History in itself is nothing 
but applied psychology. Hence we must look to theoretical 
psychology to give us the clew to its true interpretation." 

Show, A. B. The new culture-history in Germany. History 
Teacher's Magazine, IV, 215-221. A description and ap- 
praisal of Lamprecht 's contributions to history. 

Seligman, E. R, A. Economic interpretation of history. Traces 
the development of the theory and indicates its limitations. 

Shotwell, J. T. Social history and the industrial revolution. 
Report, Association of History Teachers of the Middle States 
and Maryland, 1911, pp. 6-17. The interpretation of his- 
tory. American Historical Review, XVIII, 692-709. 



466 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Application to School Instruction 

Bengel, J. Geschichte der Methodik des kulturgeschichtlichen 

Unterrichts. Wiesbaden, 1896. pp. 1-74. Includes a bib- 
liography. 
Biedermann, Karl. Der Geschichtsunterricht auf Schulen nach 

kulturgeschichtlicher Methode. Wiesbaden, 1885. pp. 5-45. 
Rossbach, J. Die Beriicksichtigung der Kulturgeschichte im 

Geschichtsunterricht. Aus der Schule fur die Schule, 1895. 

Heft 65, pp. 1-15. Contains a description and criticism 

of Biedermann's plan. 
Schnabel, F. Kulturgeschichte im Geschichtsunterricht des 

Oberklassen. Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1914. Heft 2, 

pp. 87-97. 
Woods, M. Edith. Report on the teaching of history in the schools 

of Germany and Belgium, 11-17. Describes the teaching of 

Kulturgeschichte in Belgium. 
Robinson, J. H. The new history, 132-153. History for the 

common man. 

Chapters VIII, IX, X 

MAKING THE PAST REAL. USE OF MODELS AND 
PICTURES. USE OF MAPS 

The literature is voluminous, but there has been relatively 
little analysis of the problems of interpreting visual aids. 

Adams, John. Exposition and illustration in teaching. New 
York/ 1910'. pp. 250-451. A general discussion with only 
incidental references to history. Treats of the story as 
illustration, elaboration, degree in illustration, material 
illustrations, the picture as illustration, the diagram, and 
dangers of illustration. The best general analysis. 



APPENDIX IV 467 

Weyrich, Edgar. Anschaulicher Geschichtsunterricht. Wien, 
19 10. The first and only detailed treatise. Emphasizes 
the place of the community in the teaching of history and 
presents an exhaustive survey of materials for Vienna. Slight 
analysis of problems of interpretation. The introduction 
contains suggestions of general interest and value. See 
pp. iii-xxvii. See also two articles by the same author in 
Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1911. Ueber Anschaulichkeit 
im Geschichtsunterricht. Heft 3, pp. 184-197 ; Heft 4, 
pp. 238-253. 

Brief Articles 

Salmon, Lucy M. On a certain indefiniteness in the teaching of 
history. Report, Association of History Teachers of the 
Middle States and Maryland, 1910. pp. 6-12. A "plea 
for the recognition of a certain indefiniteness in the nature 
of history itself and consequently in its teaching." 

Chad wick, R. D. Vitalizing the history work. History Teacher's 
Magazine, VI, n 2-1 21. 

Fikenscher, F. Das epische Princip im Geschichtsunterricht. 
Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 1914. Heft 3, pp. 137- 
144. 

Finlay-Johnson, Harriet. The dramatic method of teaching. 
London, no date. pp. 34-161. 

Knowlton, D. C. An Athenian assembly: an experiment in 
history teaching. School Review, Vol. 18, pp. 481-487. 

Tall, Lida Lee. Construction work in the grades. History 
Teacher's Magazine, II, 34-36. 

Page, E. C. A working museum of history. History Teacher's 
Magazine, V, 77-80. 

Salmon, Lucy M. The historical museum. Educational Re- 
view, Vol. 41, pp. 144-160. 



468 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Vincent, J. M. Historical Research, 155-167, 215-247. Pic- 
torial sources of history, the newspaper as a source, relics. 

Ames, E. W. Pictures : their use and abuse. History Teacher's 
Magazine, III, 8-10. Other articles in the same Magazine : 
Davison, Ellen S. Use of pictures in teaching, IV, 130, 
145. Hamilton, Maud. The use of illustrative material in 
secondary schools, V, 81-86. Lingelbach, W. E., and 
Tucker, H. C. Use of the lantern in history classes, IV, 
40-43. Thompson, Lillian W. Pictures in history classes, 
II, 173-179. Paullin, C. O. Proposed historical atlas of 
the United States, V, 71-73. Shepherd, W. R. Historical 
maps and their making, III, 121-123. Smith, D. E. Wall 
maps for history classes, I, 47-48. 



Chapter XI 

TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 

The materials for the study of textbooks are textbooks and 
reviews of textbooks in current periodicals. Many discussions 
of methods of teaching history contain remarks on textbooks as 
they are, or ought to be, but no general survey of the field has 
appeared. 

Textbooks in American History. A report presented by the 
committee on textbooks of the New England History Teachers' 
Association. Publication No. 3, 1898. General character- 
istics of American textbooks, with a description and appraisal 
of 19 representative books. 

Russell, W. F. Historical textbooks published before 1861. 
History Teacher's Magazine, VI, 122-125. A list of books pub- 
lished in the United States. 



appendix iv 469 

Guides to Foreign Textbooks and Other Teaching 
Apparatus 

Bibliographic de la France. Paris. Publishes annual lists for 

French schools. 
Schroder, Conrad, editor. Fiihrer durch die Lehrmittel Deutsck- 

lands. Magdeburg, 1903. 

Chapter XII 

THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 

The use of textbooks in the teaching of history is described 
incidentally in many discussions of class-room procedure but has 
rarely invited separate treatment. 

Burstall, Sara A. The proper use of the lecture system and 
the textbook. Historical Association Leaflet No. 19. Lon- 
don, 1910. 

Brunner, G. Das Lehrbuch im Geschichtsunterricht. Ver- 
gangenheit und Gegenwart, 1914, Heft 6, pp. 370-376. 

Sellery, G. C. The use of the textbook. History Teacher's 
Magazine, II, 219-222. 

General Discussions op the Recitation 

Bourne, H. E. Teaching of history and civics, 147-168. 
Burnham, S. History in the schools : a study of 100 replies of 

students as to how they were taught history. Educational 

Review, Vol. 27, pp. 521-528. 
Hartwell, E. C. The teaching of history. Boston, 1913. pp. 1-67. 
Report, Committee on methods of teaching, New England History 

Teachers' Association, 1895. pp. 5-43. 
Report, Committee of Seven, 86-110. 



47° TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Report, Committee of Ten, 185-201. 

Stevens, Romtett. Waste in history instruction. History 
Teacher's Magazine, IV, 52-55. The question as a measure 
of efficiency in instruction. New York, 191 2. 

Trenholme, N. M. Organization of the recitation. History 
Teacher's Magazine, I, 74-76. 

Wolfson, A. M. Efficiency in the history recitation. Educa- 
tional Review, Vol. 45, pp. 444-456. 

Dodge, Eva. The teaching of history in girls' schools in north 
and central Germany. Includes reports of actual lessons. 

Woods, M. Edith. The teaching of history in the schools of Belgium 
and Germany. Includes reports of actual lessons. 

Chapter XIII 

THE SELECTION AND MANAGEMENT OF COLLATERAL 
READING 

For general guides to historical literature see above, p. 443. 

For valuable material on ancient history and for expert advice 
on books see the following articles in the History Teacher's Maga- 
zine, The teaching of Greek history, IV, 194-200; 226-232; 
249-255; V, 17-23; 47-53; 81-86; 15-16; 144-152; 171-176. 
The teaching of Roman history, V, 209-218; 239-244; 323- 
328; VI, 3-12; 53-58; 103-110; 271-277. 

Bourne, H. E. Teaching of history and civics, 1 17-133. The 
school and the library. Enumerates the most useful guides 
to historical literature and suggests books for a library. 

History Teacher's Magazine. Gathany, J. M. Using magazines 
in history classes. V, 288-291. Hoover, T. N. History 
material and its keeping. Ill, 4-5. Nestor, I. F. Library 
work and collateral reading. V, 53-56. Perkins, C, 



APPENDIX IV 471 

Reference work in high school history courses. II, 124- 
126. Smith, Mary S. How to utilize the school library. 
V, 139-140. 
Menz, H. Die Zeitung in den hoheren Schulen. Vergangenheit 
und Gegenwart, 1914, Heft 1, pp. 18-24. 



Chapter XIV 

SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 

Bengel, J. Quellenbenutzung beim Geschichtsunterrichte. Ein 

geschichtlicher Abriss. Wiesbaden, 1898. pp. 3-96. In- 
cludes a bibliography. 
Rude, A. Quellen im Geschichtsunterricht. Mit besonderer 

Berucksichtigung der Kulturgeschichte. Neue Bahnen, III, 

pp. 281-292, 329-336. 
Historical sources in schools. Report of a committee of the New 

England History Teachers' Association. New York, 1902. 

Describes use of sources and gives lists of available sources 

for ancient history, mediaeval and modern European history, 

English history, and American history. 
Bourne, H. E. Teaching of history and civics, 169-187. The 

source method. 
Caldwell, H. W. Source Method of studying history in high 

schools. Proceedings, National Education Association, 1897, 

pp. 670-676. 
Frazer, N. L. The use of sources. Historical Association 

Leaflet, No. 19. London, 1910. pp. 5-8. 
Friedrich, F. Geschichtswissenschaft und Geschichtsunterricht. 

Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, 191 2, Heft 1, pp. 1-19. 
Lambeck, G. Uber die Benutzung von Quellen im geschichtlichen 

Unterricht. Ibid., Heft 5, pp. 308-312. 



472 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Schilling, M. Quellenlekture und Geschichtsunterricht. Berlin, 

1890. 
Violette, E. M. The use of source material. History Bulletin 

of the First District Normal School, Kirksville, Mo., 191 2, pp. 

36-60. 
White, Elizabeth B. An experiment in teaching local history. 
History Teacher's Magazine, IV, 205-206. 

Chapter XV 

THE CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER 
SUBJECTS IN THE CURRICULUM 

Report, Committee of Fifteen. New York, 1895. pp. 40-113. 
The correlation of studies in elementary education. 

McMurry, C. Special method in history, 222-237. The correla- 
tion of history with other studies. 

Payne, B. R. Elementary school curricula. New York, 1905. 

History and Geography 

Burr, G. L. The place of geography in the teaching of history. 
New England History Teachers' Association, 1908. 

George, H. B. The relations of geography and history. Oxford, 
1907. 

Brigham, A. P. Geographic influences in American history. 
Boston, 1903. 

Semple, Ellen C. Influences of geographic environment on the 
basis of Ratzel's system of anthropo-geography. New York, 
191 1. American history and its geographic conditions. Bos- 
ton, 1903. 

Turner, F. J. Significance of the frontier in American history. 
Yearbook, Herbart Society, 1899, pp. 7-41. 



APPENDIX IV 



473 



History and Literature 

Roosevelt, Theodore. History as literature. American His- 
torical Review, XVIII, 473-489. 
Wilson, Woodrow. Mere literature. Boston, 1896. pp. 161- 

186. 
Crothers, S. M. Gentle Reader. Boston, 1903. pp. 167-200. 
Ford, P. L. The American historical novel. Atlantic Monthly, 

Vol. 80, pp. 721-728. 
Major, Charles. What is historic atmosphere? Scribner's 

Magazine, Vol. 27, pp. 753-761. 
Matthews, Brander. The historical novel. Forum, Vol. 24, 

pp. 79-91. 
Vincent, J. M. Historical research, 317-325. The historical 

novel. 
Rice, Emily J . Course of study in history and literature. Chicago, 

1898. pp. 103-148. 

History and Government 

Report, Committee of Seven, 81-85. 

Report, Committee of Five of the American Political Science 

Association. Proceedings, 1908. 
Report, Committee of Five on the study of history in secondary 

schools, 44-53. 
Report on the relation of American history to civics in secondary 

schools. Proceedings, the North Central History Teachers 

Association, 1909. 



474 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Chapter XVI 

THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 

Article on Examinations in Monroe's Cyclopedia of Education. 
Report, Committee of Ten, 183-185 ; Committee of Seven, 130- 

134; Committee of Five, 37-38. 
Marten, C. H. K. How ought history questions to be set — and 

looked over? Historical Association Leaflet, No. 19, pp. 31- 

17- 

Salmon, Lucy M. How should the entrance paper in history be 
constructed? Educational Review, Vol. 26, 22-35. 

Starch, D., and Elliott, E. C. Reliability of grading work in 
history. School Review, Vol. 21, pp. 676-681. 

Keatinge, M. W. Studies in the teaching of history, 168-188. 

Hart well, E. C. The teaching of history, 64-67. 

History Teacher's Magazine. College Entrance Board's questions 
and ratings, IV, 256-258. Dawson, Edgar. College en- 
trance examination papers, III, 218-221; Mortality in 
history examinations and its causes, IV, 258-266 ; American 
history in entrance examinations, V, 253-256. Fite, E. D. 
College entrance examinations in history, VI, 144-146. 
Foster, H. D. Adequate tests in history, V, 1 16-123. 



APPENDIX V 

QUESTIONS ON THE TEXT 

Chapter I 

WHAT HISTORY IS 

i. Illustrate the difficulty of classifying sources. 

2. What conditions are suggested by the terms "prehistoric" 

and "historic"? 

3. Why is historical criticism necessary? 

4. Indicate the steps in historical synthesis. 

5. What kind of historical construction is suggested by the 

search for the interesting ? for the useful ? for the true ? 
/ 6. What claims has Herodotus to the title "father of history"? 

7. What reason is suggested by Thucydides for believing that 

history may be useful ? 

8. Can history be made scientific by the method of the natural 

sciences ? Why ? 

9. In what sense has history become a science ? 

10. There is a history of the United States that actually happened 
to be distinguished from the history of the United States 
that was in the mind of George Bancroft and from the 
History of the United States that is now in Bancroft's six 
volumes. Are such distinctions of any importance to 
teachers of history ? Why ? 
475 



476 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Chapter II 

THE PROBLEM OF GRADING HISTORY 

i. Indicate some special reasons for emphasizing, in discussions of 
school instruction in history, the question of what is possible. 

2. Show that the answers to this question supplied by the natural 

tastes and interests of children, by the culture-epoch theory, 
and by the principle of proceeding from the near to the 
remote are incomplete answers. 

3. In what two ways may the culture-epoch theory, as applied 

to history programs, be interpreted ? 

4. Both interpretations have been applied with success in the 

construction of history programs. Does this prove the 
validity of the theory ? Why ? 

5. "Different groups take steps in culture in a different order." 

Why is this "a sufficient comment" on the culture-epoch 
theory ? 

6. Can the past in any sense be observed directly ? What is the 

bearing of this question on the problem of grading history ? 

7. Indicate the process involved in reconstructing past mental 

states. What hints for grading history does this process 
suggest ? 

8. What images or ideas are called up in your mind when you 

pronounce the words, "Slave Power in America?" What 
inference as to the conditions of grading history do you 
draw from this experience ? 

9. How do you represent to yourself 484 B.C. ? What inference 

do you draw as to the teaching of dates in the elementary 
school ? 
10. Show that the problem of grading history is essentially a 
problem in presentation. 



APPENDIX V 477 

Chapter III 

THE QUESTION OF AIMS AND VALUES 

1. Do the aims commonly proposed for historical instruction 

furnish a distinctive argument for teaching history ? Justify 
your answer. 

2. What conditions explain the tendency to treat aims as values? 

3. On what general grounds has the value of historical instruction 

been questioned ? 

4. Have you ever observed in yourself or in others any symptoms 

of historitis ? What comment on Nietzsche's views is sug- 
gested by your answer ? 

5. Why is it necessary, in formulating specific aims for historical 

instruction, to take account of kinds of history ? 

6. Distinguish between controlling aims and incidental aims. 

7. What controlling aim is suggested by the idea of development ? 

Why? 

8. Show the relation of this aim to other aims. 

9. Indicate the difficulty of using the past to explain the present. 
10. Should one of the specific aims of historical instruction be to 

teach history ? Why ? 

Chapter IV 

HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN EUROPE 

1. Explain the general attitude toward historical instruction 

before the seventeenth century. 

2. What modern ideas of school instruction in history were 

advanced in the seventeenth century ? 

3. To what extent was history taught in the eighteenth century ? 



478 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

4. What kind of history was taught in the eighteenth cen- 

tury? 

5. Show how patriotism affected school programs in history in 

the nineteenth century. 

6. Find in the German programs that are cited applications of 

the concentric circles idea. 

7. What evidence of a changing attitude toward contemporary 

history is afforded by these German programs. 

8. In what European program, among the examples given, do 

you find the greatest emphasis upon modern history ? 

9. What differences in point of view and in organization are in- 

dicated by the examples of current elementary programs? 
10. What comment is suggested by the English attitude toward 
school instruction in history ? 



Chapter V 

HISTORY IN THE SCHOOL CURRICULUM IN THE 
UNITED STATES 

1. Compare historical instruction in the United States before 

1915 with historical instruction in Europe before the seven- 
teenth century. 

2. Point out the difference between "subjects" in history and a 

"course" in history. 

3. Can American history for American elementary schools be 

urged with the same force as German history for German 
elementary schools ? Why ? 

4. In what important respect did the Madison Conference take 

more advanced ground than later committees ? 

5. What progress in program making is indicated by the report 

of the Committee of Seven ? 



APPENDIX V 



479 



6. In what respects is the program proposed by the Committee 

of Five superior to the program proposed by the Committee 
of Seven ? 

7. Were the recommendations of the Committee of Fifteen a 

step forward or backward for historical instruction ? 
Why? 

8. Compare the program proposed in the Report of the Com- 

mittee of Twelve with the French elementary program. 

9. What conceptions of grading history are suggested by the 

program proposed by the Committee of Eight ? 
10. In the making of history programs, to judge by the recom- 
mendations of the latest of our numerous committees, we 
have not yet reached ground occupied by Russia in 1890; 
in the amount of history actually taught we stand about 
on a par with Spain. Refute or defend this statement. 



Chapter VI 

THE BIOGRAPHICAL APPROACH TO HISTORY 

1. What is the "true biographical motive"? Should works 

determined by any other motive be classed as biography? 
Why? 

2. Indicate the grounds for the following statements : 

(a) Rousseau was an advocate of biography but not of the 
biographical approach to history. 

(b) Advocates of the biographical approach to history have, 
on the whole, not been advocates of biography. 

3. To what extent is it desirable for children to clothe their own 

acts "in hero's clothes" ? 

4. Why is'it natural to link the biographical approach to history 

with the great-man theory of history ? 



480 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

5. Describe the greatness of some historical character and note 

the extent to which your description sets him apart as ex- 
ceptional. 

6. In what sense can biography be made more historical by 

making it more biographical ? 

7. Why should the grouping of men about events suggest more 

strongly than the grouping of events about men the possi- 
bility of a continuous story ? 



Chapter VII 

THE STUDY OF SOCIAL GROUPS 

Explain the persistence of political and military history in 

school instruction. 
What conditions in the world at large are reflected in the 

present general emphasis upon social history ? 
Would you argue from the history of Kulturgeschichte in 

German schools that the present war in Europe will be 

followed by a reaction in favor of military history ? Why ? 
Why is the study of group life as a whole more difficult than 

the study of group life as expressed in politics and war ? 
Show how you would use your own community in introducing 

a first grade to the study of group conditions and activities. 
Show how you would use your own community in introducing a 

seventh grade to the study of group conditions and activities. 
What are the chief difficulties in applying the point of view 

thus indicated to history in general ? 
To what extent have these difficulties been met ? 
Find in the classification proposed by Langlois and Seignobos 

hints of procedure in selecting and arranging materials for 

a senior class in the high school. 



APPENDIX V 481 

Chapter VIII 

MAKING THE PAST REAL 

1. What is the general process involved in making the past real? 

2. Make a brief list of aids to the visualization of history furnished 

by material conditions and activities in your own com- 
munity. 

3. In the order of their merit as representations of reality the 

general types of material aids to visualization may be ar- 
ranged as follows : the reality itself ; casts ; models ; or- 
dinary pictures ; maps ; diagrams. Does this order suggest 
a descending scale of merit in the use of the materials in 
school ? Why ? 

4. Indicate the conditions of making verbal description an aid 

to visualization. 

5. Analyze your impressions of Andrew Jackson and decide 

whether you think of him as a real man or as "one of those 
historical characters." If he appears "real," point out the 
factors that make him "real" to you. 

6. Illustrate the difficulty of utilizing details in the history lesson. 

7. How and to what extent can the difficulty be met ? 

8. Describe any special device for utilizing details that you would 

use with a senior class in the high school. 

Chapter IX 

THE USE OF MODELS AND PICTURES 

1. Explain the prevalence of the exhibition idea in the use of 

models and pictures. 

2. In what sense are models and pictures abstractions? 

21 



482 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

i 

3. Look at a picture of the Roman forum and describe the images 

evoked. 

4. Look at a picture of George Washington and describe the 

image evoked. 

5. What comment on the use of pictures is suggested by the 

character of these images ? 

6. Compare the process of interpreting a model with the process 

of interpreting an ordinary picture. 

7. Show how your treatment of a picture of the Sistine Madonna 

would differ from your treatment of a picture of the Roman 
Forum. 

8. Of what value are tests of the pupil's ability to identify un- 

labeled models and pictures ? 

9. Why should models and pictures be subjected to criticism 

even more exacting than that applied to verbal description ? 

Chapter X 
THE USE OF MAPS 

1 . Why are maps essential ? 

2. Show what is involved in realizing location. 

3. Show what is involved in realizing area. 

4. What adjustments are made necessary by differences in map 

scales and map projections ? 

5. Under what conditions is the visualization of actual geo- 

graphical environment essential ? 

6. To what extent is the relation between geographic conditions 

and human development "an untrodden field" in the 
teaching of history in school ? 

7. What is historical geography? 

8. Indicate any situation in history that would require for its 

interpretation a contemporary map. 



APPENDIX V 483 

9. Would you require reproductions of maps from memory? 
r Why? 

10. Work out the exercises in map construction suggested in this 

chapter, pp. 157-162. 
Note. Do not judge too hastily, if you find these exercises difficult, 

that they are unsuitable for school. In estimating the 

difficulties for pupils, allow for the directing skill of the 

teacher. 

Chapter XI 

TEXTBOOKS IN HISTORY 

x. What has been the general relation of textbooks to school 
instruction in history ? 

2. Examine any textbooks in history that may be accessible and 

find, if possible, one example of the precis type, one of the 
manuel type, and one of the cours type. 

3. Examine the extracts from textbooks quoted in this chapter 

and indicate the type of textbook treatment which each 
extract suggests. 

4. What general conditions in the United States discourage the 

cours type of treatment ? 

5. Look up in Who's Who in America the author of any text- 

book in history with which you are familiar and indicate 
how your tests of the accuracy of this textbook would be 
affected by your knowledge of the author. 

6. Show how an author's general point of view may be deter- 

mined from the proportions of a textbook in history. 

7. Examine the pictures in any textbook with which you may be 

familiar and note their relations to the text. 

8. Should a textbook in history reflect the personal opinions of 

the author ? Why ? 



484 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

Chapter XII 
THE USE OF TEXTBOOKS 

1. Why is the question of how to use a textbook of greater im- 

portance in the United States than in Europe ? 

2. Explain the decline of the memoriter method of teaching his- 

tory in the United States. 

3. Show that the type of class recitation is determined in part 

by the type of textbook. 

4. Indicate the general merits of guiding questions, outlines, and 

problems, as aids to study. 

5. Compare with the French plan of dictation and explication. 

6. Show what is involved in independent study of the history 

lesson. 

7. Read the passage quoted on p. 297 of this book and then 

answer in writing the three questions that immediately 
follow. Study the same passage in the manner suggested 
on p. 308 and write out your summary. Compare the two 
papers and comment on the results. 

8. Find in the lists of questions in this book fact questions that 

call for both analysis and synthesis. What comment on 
the classification of questions, indicated on p. 314, do these 
examples suggest ? 

9. Describe the general type of textbook recitation which, 

with your experience, point of view, and personality seems, 
on the whole, the best to you. 



APPENDIX V 485 

Chapter XIII 

THE SELECTION AND MANAGEMENT OF COLLATERAL 
READING 

1. Point out some defects in current conceptions of collateral 

reading. 

2. What are the chief purposes to be served by collateral reading ? 

3. Indicate the types of material and treatment suggested by 

each of these purposes. 

4. What should be the general character of readings to the class ? 

5. To what extent are readings by the class determined by the 

nature of the class textbook ? 

6. Why is it a cardinal mistake to treat all collateral reading as 

material for information ? 

7. Assume the following conditions : A small library ; two 

classes studying the same subject in history; 25 pupils 
in each class; general study periods for one class, 9.40- 
10.20 and 2-2.40; general study periods for the other 
class, 1 1. 20-1 2 and 3.20-4. Outline a general scheme for 
the management of collateral reading adapted to these 
conditions. 

8. Indicate the principles which you would apply in making 

additions to a small library. 



Chapter XIV 
SCHOOL HISTORY AND THE HISTORICAL METHOD 

1. Why is history in school treated so generally as a body of 

assured knowledge ? 

2. What are the general results ? 



486 TEACHING OF HISTORY 

3. Indicate results of a different character that seem desirable. 

4. Is the question of whether Pocahontas did or did not save 

the life of Captain John Smith of any historical importance ? 
Why? 

5. Is the question of how Fiske used the sources in his account 

of the discovery of America by the Norsemen of any his- 
torical importance ? Why ? 

6. In view of your answers to questions 4 and 5 would you use, 

for exercises in criticism, the materials there indicated? 
Why? 

7. What is implied in the statement that the most valuable 

material in a history may be in the footnotes? What 
bearing, if any, has this on the use of histories in the school ? 

8. Suggest exercises to train the pupil in the use of indexes and 

tables of contents. 

9. In taking notes for an extended paper the pupil should be 

trained to analyze his reading as he goes along, to enter 
only one topic on a sheet, and to write on one side of the 
sheet only. Where this rule is followed what general direc- 
tions would you give for the organization of the material 
in the notes ? 
10. Sum up the arguments for and against illustrations of the 
historical method in school. 



Chapter XV 

THE CORRELATION OF HISTORY WITH OTHER 
SUBJECTS IN THE CURRICULUM 

1. Point out the difference between incidental correlation and 

systematic correlation. 

2. Compare the opportunities for correlating history and geog- 



APPENDIX V 487 

raphy in Europe with the opportunities for correlating these 

subjects in the United States. 
Explain the unfriendly attitude toward attempts to sever 

history from its literary associations. 
Show how history contributes to literature and how literature 

contributes to history. 
Point out the difficulties and dangers in using history to 

illuminate literature and in using literature to illuminate 

history. 
What place would you assign to the historical novel in the 

teaching of history ? 
What argument is suggested by European experience in the 

teaching of government ? 
On what grounds may history be regarded as a central subject 

in the curriculum ? 



Chapter XVI 

THE HISTORY EXAMINATION 

1. What are the advantages and disadvantages of examinations 

set by authorities outside of the school ? 

2. Look up in a textbook in English history the answers to the 

questions cited in this chapter, pp. 420-422, and determine 
the extent to which they are answered directly. 

3. What comment on memory tests is suggested by the "mortality 

in history examinations" ? 

4. Work out each of the exercises suggested in this book, pp. 429- 

436. If you find them difficult, do not judge too hastily 
that they are unsuitable for school. Allow for the as- 
sumption that pupils have been trained to deal with materials 
in these ways. 



INDEX 



Action, in biography, 166, 173, 183. 

Adams, Exposition and Illustration, 
quoted, 211, 215, 250. 

Adelaide, Australia, descriptions of, 
14. IS- 

Agregation, 396. 

Aids, visual in textbooks, 283 ; peda- 
gogical in textbooks, 284; in use of 
textbooks, 297-299. 

Aims, two modes in formulation of, 
55. 56 ; contrasted in history with 
those of other subjects, 58, 73, 75 ; 
enumerated, 59 ; related to scientific 
history, 60; exercise for memory, 
61, 62; for imagination, 62; dis- 
tinctive, 63, 74; shifting heretofore, 
64, 72 ; relation to values (q.v.), 
65 ; to train judgment, 65 ; specula- 
tive, 71; in uncritical history, 72; 
in critical history, 73; to make 
world intelligible, 75, 76; to make 
social world intelligible, 78-83, 186; 
in biography, 178, 179; in history, 
178, 179; in classroom, 202; to be 
pursued, 208, 209. 

American: colleges, 100; Historical 
Association, 208, 411; Historical 
Review, 26 n. ; history, 130, 133, and 
government, 137 ; Political Science 
Association on correlation of govern- 
ment and history, 409, 410; Revo- 
lution, 34, 127, 173, 175; theory of 
personal initiative, 305, 318. 

Andrews, Gambrill, and Tall ; A Bib- 
liography of History for Schools and 
Libraries, 347. 

Archaeology 9. 

Area, relative ideas of, 247-249. 

Arnold, Thomas, plan of history course 
at Rugby, 121, 122. 

Art, substance of histories of, 12. 



Athenees Royaux. See European 

Secondary School program. 
Austria, 90; compared with Germany, 



Bahrdt, 94. 

Bain, quoted, 95. 

Barclay, 90. 

Basedow, 94, 101, 163; 's Philan- 
thropinum, 90. 

Belgium. See European Secondary 
School program. 

Berlin, 7; Ritter Akademie, 90; 
elementary program of, 124. 

Bible, 8, 84, 88, 91 ; Old and New Testa- 
ments, 89, (at Rugby), 91 ; in 
French program, 104, 105 ; in Eng- 
lish program, 122. 

Bibliography, in library, 347 ; in 
pupils' written work, 382. 

Biedermann, a retrospective arrange- 
ment, 102, 183 ; program, 196, 197. 

Biographical: survey in German 
programs, no, in, 164; stories 
from ancient history, 112. 

Biography : as approach to history, 
161-177; as bridge, 164, 171; 
arguments for, 164, 165; distinc- 
tion between history and, 162, 178; 
selection in, 165; action, 166; 
concreteness in, 167; aims, 168; 
moral influence, 169; possibilities, 
173; grouping, 173; humanizing 
element, 174; natural course to 
broader field, 174, 175. See Aims. 

Bliss, quoted, a, 34 n. 

Blocks. See Programs, Elementary, 
Secondary, German, French. 

Block system, 276. 

Bliimner. See Rausch. 

Boas, quoted, 36, 37 ». 



489 



49© 



INDEX 



Bodin, 253. 

Bourdeau, quoted, 172. 

Browning as historian, 35; quoted, 
Grammarian's Funeral, 82, 83 ; 401. 

Bryce, Lord, quoted, 253. 

Buckle, quoted, 23, 24; 68. 

Burgerschulen, 113. 

Bury, 19 n. 

Butler, Nicholas Murray, opinion on 
work of College Entrance Examina- 
tion Board, 417. 

Byron, Isles of Greece, 401. 

Carlyle, quoted, 171, 180, 181. 

Cass, Lewis (McLaughlin), 128. 

Catechism, for use in All the Churches 
of the French Empire, quoted, 97, 
98. 

Cato, quoted indirectly, 171, 172. 

Charts, 213, 214, 215. See Maps. 

Christian era, 6. 

Christianity, emphasis of, 26. 

Chronological treatment, 101. 

Chronology, 9; "freed from," 60. 

Cleveland, Grover, letter credited to, 7. 

Collateral reading, 283. 292, 293; se- 
lection and management of, 323-350 ; 
obstacles in way of, 325 ; weakness 
in selection, 326; results from, 326; 
grading, 327; resources, 328, 335, 
336; requirements, 328; exagger- 
ated claims for, 329; use of, 329; 
purposes of, 330; for making past 
real, 331; for information, 331, 
332, 345 ; for interest or inspiration, 

332, 333. 340, 345 ; to give ac- 
quaintance to historical literature, 

333. 334. 340; to illustrate the 
historical method, 334, 335, 340; 
concreteness in, 337; simplified 
versions, 337, 338; to the class, 
338; by the class, 339; range 
regulated by textbook, 340; rules 
for assigning, 341 ; independent 
searching, 342 ; plan for pupils' 
records, 343; teachers' guide to, 
343-345- See Libraries. 

College Entrance Examination Board, 
417, 424, 425. 



College entrance requirements, 137- 
139; American history in, 137; 
as affecting high school courses, 138; 
committee on, 141. 

Colleges, 103 ; for girls, 109. 

Colonial boundaries, as subject to be 
presented to seventh grade, 365- 
367. 

Columbia, 138; Conference, 139; 
program, 140, 141. 

Columbus, Christopher, varying ac- 
counts of, 351-355- 

Comenius, 86, 87 ; his work for history 
in the schools, 96, 179, 391. 

Commissioner of Education, report of, 
137. 138. 

Committee of Eight, 39; purpose of, 
154; program of, 155; biographical 
plan, 176. 

Committee of Fifteen, Report of, 150. 

Committee of Five appointed, 148; 
program, 149; on correlation of 
government and history, 411. 

Committee of Seven, 142, 143; pro- 
grams, 143, 144; ideas of history, 
145-149, 153, 158, 276; on collateral 
reading, 324, 325 ; incidental correla- 
tion, 389-391 ; correlation of gov- 
ernment and history, 408, 409; on 
concentration, 413. 

Committee of Ten created, 134; re- 
port of, 135, 136, 142 ; on textbooks, 
312. See Madison Conference. 

Committee of Twelve appointed, 151; 
plan of, 152. 

Committee on Social Studies, 160. 

Comparison and Appreciation in ex- 
amination, 429. 

Concentration, 393, 395. 412. 4*3- 

Concentric circles, 123; 152. 

Concrete facts. See Particular facts. 

Concreteness in textbooks, 277; the 
most important element, 279; in 
collateral reading, 337. 

Conference on History, Civil Govern- 
ment, and Political Economy, the 
program of, 134, 135; 137; 142. 

Continuity, chronological, 33; in 
presentation, 49, 61 ; in biographi- 



INDEX 



491 



cal method, 1 75 ; through political 
and military emphasis, 186, 201 ; by 
grouping, 192-196; through pictures, 
_L97, 198; in school history, 361- 
365- 

Correlation of history with other sub- 
jects, 389-414. See Incidental Cor- 
relation. See Systematic Correla- 
tion. See Concentration. 

Coulanges, Fustel de, quoted, 11, 350, 
35i- 

Cousin, quoted, 171. 

Critical history. See History. 

Criticism, external, 7 ; internal, 10 ; 
results, 16. See Language. 

Culture-epoch theory, as guide 
in selection, 30, 31, 32; two 
interpretations, 33, 34; signifi- 
cance, 36 ; applied in Herbart- 
Ziller-Rein school, 102 ; influence 
on European elementary pro- 
gram, 123, 164, 166, 198; in cor- 
relation, 393. 

Curriculum, 85, 86, 87. 

d'Alembert, 101. 

Democracy, 185. 

Denmark, 87. 

De Tocqueville, 80. 

Development, idea of, 126. 

Diagrams, 213, 214, 215. See Maps. 

Diaries, 222, 331. 

Didactic history, 17, 18, 22. 

Diplomatics, 9. 

Dramatics, making past, real, 221. 

Dryden's use of biography, 162. 

Economic history, 184, 185. 

Edison kinetoscope, 213. 

Education, facts for purposes of, 17. 
See Commissioner of. 

Educational Bi-Monthly on simplify- 
ing great histories for children, 
quoted, 337, 338. 

Educational value of history, 71. 

Educator's attitude toward history, 30, 
61, 64, 159. 

Eighteenth Century attitude toward 
history in Europe, 88, 91, 93, 96; in 



United States, 127; toward exam- 
inations, 415. 

Elementary school programs, in Eu- 
rope, 104, 122-125; ha the United 
States, 120-135, 150-155; contrast 
in Europe and U. S., 155, 156. 

Elson, Side Lights on American His- 
tory, quoted, 336. 

Encyclopaedia Britannica, quoted, 
description of Adelaide, Australia, 
15 w. ; 20. 

England, 6; 87; history of, at 
Rugby, 122; length of biographical 
survey in, 167. 

English history, 91 ; manual, 86, 133, 
136, 137 ; part of an examination in, 
436; language, 37- 

English Privy Council, 86; 96. 

Environment, physical. See Physical 
element. 

Epigraphy, 9. 

Europe, 84. 

European Secondary School program, 
Sweden, 120; Belgium, Athendes 
Royaux, 120; Russia, 121; Italy, 
121; Spain, 121 ; in England, 121, 
122. 

Examination of sources, 363-388. 

Examinations, history, 414-438; defi- 
nition, 414; origin, 414; develop- 
ment, 415 ; in sixteenth century, 
415, 416; Prussian system of, 416; 
in United States, 417 ; as determined 
and determining factor, 418, 426, 
438; subjects that lend themselves 
to, 418, 419; typical American high 
school, 419-424; contrast of Eng- 
lish and American, 424; questions 
too difficult, 426; correct elements 
in, 428 ; possible modes of procedure, 
428-438. 

Exhibition idea, 225; simplicity of, 
227; overestimated, 227. 

Experience, as an interpreter, 42, 43, 
46, 47, 52, 53- 

Extent, relative ideas of, 247-249. 

External criticism, 7; province, 7; 
uncertainties, 8; work for experts, 
9; fraudulent sources, 10; aim, 10. 



492 



INDEX 



Facts, selection of, 16; purpose, 17- 
19; embrace three types of phe- 
nomena, 40; particular or general, 
44; concrete or abstract, 49, 50; 
historical, denned, 51; range, 53, 
54; in French program, 109; as 
biography, 161; as history proper, 
161, 427; in examination, deter- 
mination of, 427. See Particular 
Facts. See Selection. 

Fartherland, the, 96, 97 ; new emphasis 
on history of, 99. 

Feelings. See Thoughts. 

Fiske's, John, account of Lexington, 
4- 

Fiske's Discovery of America I, ex- 
tracts from, 372, 373, 376. 

Fletcher, quoted, 71. 

France, 87; oral instruction in, 
287. 

Francke, as an advocate of history, 
89. 

Frederick the Great, 90. 

French, 14 ; Revolution place in Bliss' 
program, 34. 

French history, 88, 92 ; proposals, 
96, 97 ; politics, 103 ; secondary 
schools, 103-106; with geography, 
106, 107. 

French program, 91, 92, 95, 97; vary- 
ing degree of emphasis, 103, 104; 
1802-1890, 104-110, 114, 119, 124; 
the most advanced example of its 
kind, 126, 167; 

French Revolution, 25, 88; effect on 
emphasis in teaching, 91; Re- 
public, 88. 

Froude, quoted, 14. 

Gall and Rebhann models, 210. 

Gedicke, quoted, 96, 97. 

Geographical influence on human de- 
velopment, treatment of, 252-254. 
See Maps. 

Geography, historical, 255, 256; in 
library 347 ; correlated with his- 
tory, 394-397- 

German Emperor (present), quoted, 



German historians, 180, 182. 

German programs, Minden, 1824, no, 
in ; Schleusinger, 1841, in ; Miihl- 
hausen, 1841, in; Minister, 1842, 
1851, 1856, in, 112; Nordhausen, 
1842, 1848, 1856, 1878, 112, 113, 
114; Prussia, 114, 117; Saxony, 
115, 116, 117. 

German programs and textbooks, 93 
(eighteenth century). 

Germany, 87, 88, 92, 114, 119. 

Gooch, History and Historians of the 
Nineteenth Century, 402, 403, 
412. 

Gordy and Twitchell, quoted, 60, 61; 
152. 

Government correlated with history, 
406; in Europe, 407; author's 
opinion on correlation with his- 
tory, 412 n. See Committee of 
Five. See Committee of Seven. See 
American. 

Grades, kindergarten, 30, 35 ; first, 30, 
50, 360; collateral reading, first to 
sixth, 336; fifth and sixth, 33; 
fifth or sixth and on, 336; seventh 
and eighth, 33 ; sixth, 34, 360, 370- 
372. 385; fourth, 360, 363; fourth 
or fifth, 361; fifth or sixth, 364; 
sixth or seventh, 259-262, seventh, 
263-267, 343, 344, 377; interme- 
diate, 271; upper, 272; eighth, 
377; American history in, 397. 

Grading history, 28-54; no clear 
principles of, 2g ; compared with 
mathematics, 29, 30 ; with language, 
29, 30; problem solved in part, 30; 
natural tastes as guide in, 31, 39; 
culture-epoch theory as guide in, 
32-39 ; by time and space from near 
to remote, 38, 39; for earlier years, 
50, 101 ; in biography, 167; in 
grouping, 188, 189; in use of models 
and pictures, 234; in collateral 
reading, 327. 

Great man theory, 172, 173. 

Greek (early) usage of word history, 
19; history, 88, 104; writers, 91; 
language, 85, 99, 113. 



INDEX 



493 



Greeks, 20, 82, 94, 99. 
Green, John Richard, quoted, 202. 
Grimm, Jacob, on correlation, 398. 
Group life, expanding views of, 201. 
Grouping of facts by pupils, 377, 378. 
Groups, 186-190, 194-201. 
Gymnasium, 113. 

Gymnasium programs. See German 
programs. 

Harvard, 130; entrance examination, 
415- 

Haupt, the grouping arrangement of, 
102. 

Hayne. See Webster-Hayne debate. 

Headmasters' Association, 148. 

Hebrews, 34; example of, in handing 
down traditions, 84. 

Hecataeus of Miletus, 20. 

Heeren, 180. 

Hellas, 21. 

Hencell models, 209, 210. 

Herbart, correlation, 391. 

Herbart-Ziller-Rein school, 102. 

Herder, 180. 

Herodotus, 19; a real investigator, 20, 
21,22; the predetermined good, 57 ; 
on geographic influence, 253, 361-364. 

Hieroglyphics, exercise in, 383-385. 

Higher Criticism. See Internal criti- 
cism. 

High school programs. See Secondary 
school programs. 

High school plan of map lesson, 259; 
senior class, 267 ; results, 387, 388. 

Historical albums. See Pictures. 

Historical construction, grouping, 377, 
378; selection, 378; in high and 
elementary, 378, 385 ; written work 
m i 378-383 ; definite system, 382 ; 
historical criticism in, 383 ; idea of 
cause and effect from, 385, 386. 

Historical criticism, specific achieve- 
ments in, 383. 

Historical fiction, 398; opinions of, 
403; accuracy in, 404. 

Historical method, 350-388; training 
in, 359. See Criticism. See Syn- 
thesis. 



"Historical mindedness," acquired, 32; 
development of, 34, 38, 195; op- 
posed to originality of character, 
67. 

Historical novelists, 35. See Litera- 
ture. 

Historic period, 5 ; beginning, 5 ; pas- 
sage from prehistoric to, 6. 

History, definition, purpose, concern, 
method, result of, 1; kinds, 17, 57, 
72; meaning, 19; scientific, 24-27; 
for schools, 28-54, 350-388; ele- 
mentary, 49, 50; ephemeral nature 
of, 57 ; shaped by predetermined 
good, 57 ; place in curriculum, 63, 
86, 155, 159, 160, 427; critical, 
uncritical, 72, 73; history of, 75; 
broad demand upon, 76-83 ; be- 
ginnings of, 84; a professional 
subject, 84-86; for European 
schools in eighteenth and nineteenth 
century, 91-126; in schools of 
United States, 127-161; as first in 
program, 1 79 ; scope, 203 ; romantic 
treatment, 402 ; literature contrib- 
utes to, 405, 406; concentration 
about, 412, 413 ; as means of training 
and culture, 427, 437; universal in 
secondary schools, 122; what school 
should do, 126. See Scientific his- 
tory. See Political history. 

Hohenzollern, 97. 

Homer, 19. 

Illustrative materials not used intelli- 
gently and coherently, 226. See 
Pictures. See Maps. See Models. 

Imagery, 45, 46; aids to, 225, 227. 

Imagination, work for, 62 ; in dramatic 
historical field, 221; use of, to 
make past real, 221, 222; work for, 
228. 

Incidental correlation, 389, 391. 

Indians presented as group, 190-194. 

Industrial influence, 185, 199- 

Interest, guard against mistaking, 217. 

Interpretation, 45. See Experience. 

Irving, Washington, Columbus, 355. 

Italy, 88; program of, 121. 



494 



INDEX 



Jacatot, on correlation, 391. 
Jameson, quoted, 73. 
Johnson. See Macaulay. 

Karlsefni, Thorfinn, Saga. See North- 
men, Columbus, and Cabot, Original 
Narratives. 

Keatinge, Studies in the Teaching of 
History; on examinations, 423. 

Key to mental experiences for be- 
ginners, 49. 

Knowledge, historical, 70. See Values. 

Kohlrausch, 97. 

Kulturgeschichte, 87, 93, 102, 123, 126, 
183, 184, 196. 

Lamprecht, 184. 

Langlois and Seignobos, Introduction to 

the Study of History, n, 14, 15, 63, 

187, 199, 200, 396. 
Language, elusive ; difficulties of exact- 
ness in, 11; interpretation of, 12; 

English, 37 ; Latin, 37. 
Languages, grading, 29, 30; primitive, 

36, 37; modern, 37, 136. 
Latin language, 37, 85, 99. "3. 136; 

school, 85, 87. 
Laurie, quoted, 32, 33, 35. 
Lavisse and Parmentier's Album 

Historique, 211, 212. 
Law, 12. 

Lecky, quoted, 69. 
Lecture method, 288. 
Leonardo da Vinci, bust attributed to, 7. 
Libraries, 325; kind, 345; selection, 

345-348 ; teacher's responsibility 

in securing, 348, 349. 
Lincoln, Gettysburg, 431. 
Literature, 12; correlated with history, 

397-400; emphasis on, 398, 399; 

contrast between history and, 400- 

402, 405, 406. See Historical fiction. 

See names of authors. 
Local resources, use of, 38, 39, 92, 94, 

189, 203-206, 251. 
Longfellow's Paul Revere, 398, 399, 400. 
Luther, 25 ; quoted through Nietzsche, 

66, 67 ; on history teaching, 86. 
Lycees, 103 ; for girls, 109. 



Macaulay, 181, 182, Johnson, 350. 

Mace, quoted, 198, 199. 

McMurry, Charles, A Special 
Method in History, 153. 

Madison Conference on History, Civil 
Government, Political Economy, 
134, i57» 3H> 312; on need for 
reference books, 323, 324; on exam- 
inations, 418. See Committee of Ten. 

Mann, Horace, quoted on textbooks, 
312. 

Maps, use of, 241-269; purpose, 241, 
242; interpretation, 244, 245, 252; 
plan for, 245, 257-259; influence on 
history, 255; historical, 262; as 
aids to visualization of past, 208; 
213; interpretation in examina- 
tion, 429. See Area, Extent, Geog- 
raphy. 

Massachusetts, history in curriculum, 
128, 129. 

Mathematics, orderly progression in, 
29, 30. 

Mather, Cotton, his criticism of 
printers, 8; Magnolia, 8. 

Memory, 61, 62, 132, 183; in repro- 
duction of maps, 257, 258; in out- 
line method, 300, 304; questions, 
317 ; 386, 427, 428, 437 ; in examina- 
tion, 419, 427. 

Mercator projection, 245, 246, 250, 251. 

Michigan, attitude toward history, 
129; University, 130. 

Military history, 179-183. 

Miller, Joaquin, Sail On, 401. 

Minden. See German programs. 

Models, 204, 225-240; Hensell, 209; 
purpose of, 225; as aids only, 288; 
size, 229; primary purpose, 231. 
See Area, Extent, Pictures. 

Montesquieu, Spirit of the Laws, indi- 
rectly quoted, 253. 

Moser, 180. 

Miihlhausen. See German programs. 

Miinster. See German programs. 

Museums, as resources, 204 ; particular, 

205, 206; cooperation with schools, 

206, 207. 
Mythology, 12. 



INDEX 



495 



Napoleon in Bliss' program, 34; 40; 
42 ; 97 ; downfall of, 98. 

Napoleonic, 97; wars, 180. 

Narrative (story telling history), 17, 
18, 22, 183. 

National Education Association, 133, 
134, MS, I5i. !S2. 

National history, 119, 123. 

New England Association of Colleges 
and Preparatory Schools, Com- 
mittee, 138, 139. 

New England History Teachers' Asso- 
ciation, quoted, 300. 

Newspapers, 13, 14. 

Nietzsche, attitude toward historical 
study, 65, 66. 

Nineteenth century attitude toward 
history, 94, 96, 98; the century of 
history, 125, 126, 184, 185; exam- 
inations in, 415. 

Nordhausen. See German programs. 

Northmen, Columbus, and Cabot, 
Original Narratives, 374, 375, 376. 

Novelists, historical, 35. See Histori- 
cal fiction. 

Oberrealschulen, 113. 

Oral instruction, 286; contrast of 
American and European use of, 
287 ; in European method, 287- 
289. 

Organization by grouping, 198-201. 

Paleography, 9. 

Parkman — , 404. 

Parmentier. See Lavisse. 

Particular facts, 44, 45; the A B C's 
of history, 48; key for beginners, 
49 ; make up elementary history, 49, 
50; determination of, 351-354. See 
Selection. 

Past, the : embraces three types of phe- 
nomena, 40; Nietzsche's attitude 
toward, 66; other sentiments con- 
cerning, 67; general attitude to- 
ward, 68; to interpret own times, 
69, 70; values of, 73; differences 
from present, 125; making — real, 
202-224. See Reality. 



Patriotic motive, 126, 168. 

Patriotism, 98, 132, 164. 

Peacock, Thomas Love quoted, 402. 

Peloponnesian War, 21. 

Periods (French), two, 109, no. 

Pestalozzi, 102. 

Petrarch, 8. 

Phenomena, three general kinds of 
the past, 40; first type, 40; second 
type, 41 ; third type, 42. 

Philology, 9. 

Philosophy, 12. 

Photography, 10. 

Physical element one of the phenomena 
in interpreting the past, 40; for 
definite imagery, 45. 

Pictures, aids to visualization, 208; 
limitations of, 210, 211; historical 
albums of Europe, 211, 212; 
general field of, 212; moving, 213; 
225-240; purpose, 225, 231; aids 
only, 228; size, 229. 

Place sense in children, 53 ; 246. 

Plutarch, 162, 168. 

Political history, 179, 180, 183, 198, 
199; activities as thread of con- 
tinuity, 201. 

Politics, facts for, 17, 132, 182, 186. 

Polybius, 26. 

Powell, reference to his history, 39. 

Prehistoric period, 5 ; duration, 5 ; 
passage to historic, 6. 

Preliminary practice method, 308-311 ; 
the recitation in, 310; ideal of, 310. 

Presentation, essential problem of 
adapting history to school, 50; 
range, 53, 54; to make world in- 
telligible, 75; of school history, 
364-371; results, 371. 

Proportion, sense of, dependent on 
selection of facts, 48. 

Questions, to give reality to map lesson, 
263-267 ; as aids in interpreting 
textbooks, 274; to raise in exami- 
nation of textbooks, 270-284, 303; 
guidance, 297, 298; method, 306, 
307; in recitation, 313; of two 
kinds, 314; wrong kind, 315; right, 



496 



INDEX 



316; memory, 317, 427; to be 
raised of collateral reading lists, 
328, 334, 335 ; to be raised in school 
history, 356 ; preliminary, 361 ; to 
be raised on examination, 416; 
" thought," 419. See Examinations. 
See Textbooks. 

Randall, Life of Thomas Jefferson, 
quoted, 432-435. 

Ranke, 184, 403, 405. 

Rausch and Bliimer models, 210. 

Realgymnasien, 113, 119. 

Realien, 394. 

Reality, in imaging past, 202 ; within 
community, 203-206; beyond com- 
munity, 206-208; first step toward, 
223. See Maps, Pictures. 

Realschulen, 113, 119. 

Rebhann. See Gall. 

Recitation, 310, 320; the teacher's 
responsibility in, 321, 322. 

Recognition of degrees of probability 
in examination, 434. 

Reference books. See Collateral Read- 
ing. 

Religion, facts for purposes of, 17. 

Religious dogma, 12; ideas for group- 
ing, 199. 

Remains. See Sources. 

Reporters, 13, 14. 

Restoration, influence for caution in 
history teaching in France, 106. 

Results, 55 ; 65 ; desired realized in 
too slight a degree, 69. 

Rhodes, James Ford, quoted, 403. 

Riedel, quoted in substance, 96. 

Rolland, 92 ; 96. 

Rollin, quoted, 89, 92, 132. 

Rousseau's Entile, 89, 90, 93, 162 ; 163, 
164. 

Sallust, quoted indirectly, 171. 
Salzmann, 94. 
Saxony, Elector of, 90. 

XSchleusingen. See German programs. 
Schlosser, 180. 

100I history, teachers' conception 
3So, 354; differentiate it from 



fiction, 351; indefinite facts stated 
definitely in, 354, 355; results, 
356, 357, 387, 388; descrimination 
in, 358; purpose of, 359; contin- 
uity in, 361, 365 ; examples of pres- 
entation to seventh grade, 364-378 ; 
historical construction, 377-386; dis- 
tribution of topics, 386. See Sources. 

Science, 12. 

Scientific history, 53, 57; aims of 
history related to, 60, 73 ; dominated 
by the idea of development, 74, 75. 

Scott, Ivanhoe, 401, 402. 

Secondary School programs in Europe, 
85, 88, 97-99, 103-122 ; inU. S. 130- 
150; contrast in America and Eu- 
rope, 155. 156. 

Seignobos, L'A ntiquite, 279. See Lang- 
lois and Seignobos. 

Selection, range in grades, 29; at 
beginning, 46; in ) field of thought, 
46 ; of facts tobe-ldcalized definitely, 
52; in biography, 165, 178-185; in 
grouping, 188-190; simplified by 
Biedermann's plan, 197 ; as a 
remedy for worst offense, 216-224; 
difficulties in, 218, 219; emphasis 
in, 220; proportion in, 220; by 
pupils, 378; of facts in school 
histories, 354-356; of material in 
examinations, 435. 

Sense of mastery, 319. 

Sense of proportion, 175. 

Shakespeare as historian, 35. 

Shepherd's atlas, 259, 429. 

Smith's True Relation, Narratives of 
Early Virginia, extracts from, 368, 
369- 

Social groups, 178-201; history, 184; 
changes, 185. 

Source books, 219; method, 360. 

Sources, kinds, 2, 3 ; traditions, 2 ; 
loss of, 4, 5; extant, 6; require- 
ments for criticism, 9; inadequate, 
196; primary, 126; primary as 
distinguished from secondary, 371. 

Spencer, Herbert, quoted, 70, 94, 95. 

Stephens, Morse, French Revolution, II, 
224. 



INDEX 



497 



Stevens, Miss, The Question as a 
Measure of Efficiency in Instruction, 
quoted, 313, 314, 317. 

Synthesis, 6 ; definition of, way pre- 
pared for, 16; aims of, 16, 17. 

Systematic correlation, 389, 391 ; used 
in each subject, 392 ; difficulties of, 
393; schemes of, 393. See Geog- 
raphy. See Literature. See Gov- 
ernment. 

Tacitus, 122. 

Tastes, natural, 31 ; acquired, 32. See 
Interest. 

Textbooks, 148; 159; in history, 
260-286; contrast of American and 
European use of, 269, 287 ; relation 
to programs, 269 ; classification of, 
270; purpose of, 270, 271; excerpts 
examined, 272-280, interpretation 
of, 274; concreteness in, 277. The 
most important element in, 279; 
requirements for, 270-285; author 
of, 280, 281 ; visual aids in, 283 ; 
pedagogical aids, 284; lack in, 284; 
interest in, 285 ; use of, 286- 
323; type of, 291, 303; as guide, 
293 ; summary type, 293 ; cours 
type, 294; how to use, 294-299, 
302 ; lesson assigned from, 304, 
305 ; personal initiative in use 
of, 305; three modes in use of, 
306-311 ; other ways in use of, 311 ; 
use of several, 312; questions on, 
313-318; problems in use of, 286, 
318-322; teacher's responsibility in, 
321, 322; supplemented, 323, 324; 
as collateral reading, 326, 327 ; 
thoroughness in one, 329; influence 
on range of collateral reading, 240. 

Thierry, 402. 

Thomas, quoted, 37, 38 ». 

Thucydides, 21; 22; aim of history 
to be useful, 57 ; 94; 122; 429-431. 

Time sense in children, 52. 



Tompkins, quoted, 46. 

Traditions. See Sources. 

Twitchell. See Gordy and Twitchell. 

Uncritical history. See History. 

United States, printing of constitution 
of, 9; history as taught in, 62, 77, 
I 3°, 133 ; schools differ from those of 
Europe, 99, 100; recognition of his- 
tory in secondary schools in, 127, 128; 
history in elementary schools, 130, 
131 ; biographical survey in, 167. 

United States' program at first not 
systematic, 130, 131 ; of various 
committees (q.v.), 131-160; prob- 
lem, 156; conservatism, 158. 

Values, 55 ; relation to aims, 65 ; of 
historical knowledge, 70, 71 ; varying, 
72; in uncritical history, 72; in 
critical history, 73 ; educational, of 
history, 71, 132. 

Verbal descriptions, inadequacy of, 
43- 

Vidal-Lablache maps, 249. 

Visualization, essential in use of maps, 
245, 251. See Reality. 

Voltaire, first attempt to produce a real 
history of civilization, 180. 

Wallace, Alfred Russel, quoted (note), 

68. 
War, 186. See Military history. 
Webster, Noah, 127. 
Webster-Hayne debate, quoted, 222, 

434- 
Weise, Christian, Der Kluge Hofmeister, 

87. 
Wimpheling, Jacob, 86 ; 96. 
Winckelmann, 180. 
Wister, Owen, Lady Baltimore, 403. 
Written work in recitation, 318; in 

historical construction, 378; plan 

of, 379; subjects for, 380-383. 

Ziller, method of correlation, 393. 



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